LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 

('h.'il)hi79( o|»yright No. 



UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST 



BOOKS BY WILLIAM ELLIOT GRIFFIS. 



THE ROMANCE OF DISCOVERY: A Thousand Ykars 
OF Exploration and the Unvkii.inc ok Conti- 
nents. 305 pages. With five fiiil-])a<;c' I llustialions by 
Frank T. Merrill. Cloth, gilt top. i2mo. ^1.50. 

THE ROMANCE OF AMERICAN COLONIZATION : Ilcnv 
THE Foundation Stones of Ouk History were 
Laid. 295 pages. With five full-page Illustrations by 
Frank T. Merrill. Cloth, gill top. 121110. #1.50. 

THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST: The Story ok 
American Expansion throucjh Arms and Diplo- 
macy. 316 pages. With five full-page Illustrations by 
Frank T. Micrrill. Cloth, gilt top. i2ino. #1.50. 




THE CONTINENTAL SCLDIER. 



THE 

ROMANCE OF CONQUEST 

THE STORY OF AMERICAN EXPANSION 
THROUGH ARMS AND DIPLOMACY 

BY 

WILLIAM ELLIOT GRIFFIS 

MEMBER OK THE AMERICAN HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION 

AUTHOR OK "BRAVE LITTLE HOLLAND, IHE PILGRIMS IN THEIR 

THREE HOMES, IHE ROMANCE OK DISCOVERY," "THE 

ROMANCE OK AMERICAN COLONIZATION," ETC. 

ILLUSTRATED BY 
FRANK T. MERRILL 




BOSTON AND CHICAGO 
W. A. WILDE COMPANY 






liik^ 






Copyright, 1899, 

By W. a. Wilde Company. 

AJ/ rights reserved. 



THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 



TWO COPIES RECEIVED. 



' ^ ef Of ' 



8ECO1MD COPY, 



HBcticateti to 
MY COMRADES 

IN THE FORTY-FOURTH PENNSYLVANIA VOLUNTEERS 

(merchants' REGIMENT OF PHILADELPHIA) 

WHO HAD AND WHO HAVE 

FAITH IN GOD AND THEIR COUNTRY 



PREFACE. 

When the " Free Quakers " of Philadelphia inscribed 
on their new meeting-house " Erected in the year of our 
Lord, 1783, of the Empire 8," they were not "Jingos" or 
" imperialists," but believers in God and in the growth of 
the United States of America. Among these Friends, 
who had drawn sword for their country, were my ancestors 
and kinsmen. It is not wonderful that their descendant 
inherits also their view. 

To-day there are those who read the words "empire" 
and "expansion" in the same light. They see in the 
events of the pivotal year of 1898 the Divine hand, and 
they hear in the new developments fresh calls to duty. 
On history is based surest prophecy. Those who are 
most familiar with the story of our country will be best 
fitted to comprehend intelligently the part they are called 
upon to play in the future. 

With emphasis upon the original meaning of the word 
" conquest," I have in this volume told the story of our 
national expansion and of the triumphs of American arms 
and diplomacy from July 4, 1776, when we began to be a 
corporate nation or empire, until this first year of Greater 
America. 

7 



8 PREFACE. 

Expansion, either of ideas or of territory, is no new 
thing to Americans. The Northwest Territory, the Lou- 
isiana Purchase, the acquisitions of Florida, Texas, Ore- 
gon, California, the Gadsden Purchase, and Alaska were 
but the preludes to the annexation of Hawaii and of island 
territory in the Indies, both East and West. 

The story is one without partisanship. Those who 
built the Greater America were not Federalists or Whigs, 
Democrats or Republicans, but patriots. The brave sol- 
diers who defended the flag in the field, the sailors who 
bore it in peace or war to the ends of the earth, the 
diplomatists abroad or the statesmen at home, were of all 
parties. In forming our national policy they represented 
no section, but the nation only. To do justice to all the 
makers of Greater America, of every race and color, has 
been my aim. If in this work I have given more promi- 
nence to the navy than the average historical writer, it is 
because the facts require it. Indeed, it is only now that 
our people seem waking up to the full importance of our 
marine and its influence upon the development of the 
greatest, as it will be, we trust, the best, nation on earth. 



W. E. G. 



Ithaca, N.Y., 

April, 1899. 



TABLE OF CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER PAGE 

I. Westward the Course of Empire . . .13 

II From Lexington to Stillwater .... 22 

III. The Navy in the Revolutionary War . . 31 

IV. From Saratoga to Yorktown .... 39 
V. The Stars and Stripes in the Mediterranean . 47 

VI. From Confederation to Constitution ... 57 

VII. The Movement beyond the Alleghanies . . 66 

VIII. War with France on the Sea .... 76 

IX. Our Navy in the Mediterranean .... 86 

X. Doubling the National Domain .... 97 

XI. Why a Second War for Freedom was fought . 104 

XII. The Naval Campaign of 1812 . . . -113 

XIII. Our Flag kept flying on Lakes and Seas . . 120 

XIV. '-Old Ironsides'* and Cotton Bales . . . 129 
XV. Madison and Monroe 140 

XVI. The Seminole and Black Hawk Wars . . 149 

XVII. Our Northwestern Empire 162 

XVIII. Old "Rough and Ready" in Mexico . . -175 

XIX. The Navy and Army at Vera Cruz . . .189 

XX. Scott's Advance to the City of Mexico . . 200 

XXI The American Sailor in the Far East . .213 

9 



lO 



TABLE OF CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER 

XXII. Confederates and Federals 

XXIII. The War for Freedom 

XXIV. A United Country . . . 

XXV. American Marines and Sailors in Korea 

XXVI. Our Expanding Empire on the Pacific 

XXVII. Our War with Spain .... 

XXVIII. The American Flag in the Philippines 

XXIX. Santiago and Porto Rico . 

XXX. The Greater United States 



PAGE 

221 

233 

244 
251 
263 
275 
284 

290 

299 



ILLUSTRATIONS. 

PAGE 

The Continental Soldier .... Frontispiece 23 
"Why do you do that?" said the President . . .61 

The Batde of New Orleans 136 

Captain May's Charge at Resaca de la Palma . .170 
March to the Sea 241 



THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

CHAPTER I. 

WESTWARD THE COURSE OF EMPIRE. 

DETWEEN the ideas of discovery and conquest 
L-' there is a close connection, for most nations 
that have made discoveries proceeded to conquer 
and subdue the new-found lands. Yet not all 
nations succeed in planting colonies. The Spanish, 
French, and Portuguese failed. As Powers, they 
have passed out of America. The two modern 
peoples who have best succeeded are the English 
and the Dutch. These now lead the way with 
precedents and experience. The people that are 
now leaving the limits of their continent and enter- 
ing upon this part of the world's work, in both the 
Indies, are the Americans. 

Although their own first home land was only the 
Atlantic coast strip between the ocean and the Alle- 
ghanies, yet they have won by discovery, coloniza- 
tion, arms, or diplomacy the whole region bounded 

13 



14 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

by the Atlantic and the Pacific and the northern 
lakes and the Gulf; the vast territory of Alaska, 
inland and insular; and large possessions in the 
East and the West Indies. The United States of 
America have become, in the full sense of the word, 
a World Power, and, in a double sense, "the great 
Pacific Power." 

The expansive movement of human history was 
first from Mesopotamia to the Mediterranean, then 
to the Atlantic, then to the Pacific Ocean, and it is 
still onward. The Far East has become the Near 
West. 

There have been many kinds of conquest, some 
by deliberate plan long before thought out, and 
again by sudden action on account of necessity. 
Some were in righteousness ; others in wrong and 
cruelty. In this book we shall write the romance 
of American conquest, which began in colonial days. 
Though at times marked with wrong and injustice, 
as all human history is, in the main it is a story of 
honorable acquisition. 

What is a conqueror, and what is conquest.? 
One thinks of the word, which sounds so grand in 
poetry, as in Mrs. Hemans's verse: — 

" Bring flowers to strew in the conqueror's path, 
He hath shaken thrones with his stormy wrath ; 
The turf looked red where he won the day. 
Bring flowers to strew in the conqueror's way." 



WESTWARD THE COURSE OF EMPIRE. 15 

With conquest we associate the idea of subjuga- 
tion. Now it is well to look at the meaning of 
words, and note how they change. Let us see how 
the term " conqueror " grew into its present shape. 

Back in the old Roman days the treasurer, com- 
missary, or quartermaster was called a quaestor. 
To this day the treasurers in the Dutch churches 
in Holland and America are called quaestors. 
Then a con-quoestor, or conquisitor, was a man who 
searched for, and procured, brought together and 
collected, money, men, or supplies. In other words, 
he was a recruiting officer. Out of this old Latin 
mother-word came ours. So also a "conqueror" in 
the Middle Ages, even when applied to William of 
Normandy, did not mean one who unlawfully seized 
land or possessions or subjugated a nation, but 
rather one who purchased or acquired territory. 
In old feudal law "conquest" meant the acquisition 
of property by other means than by inheritance. 
In Scotch law " conquest " still refers to property 
acquired by purchase, or gift, or by marriage 
contract. 

American conquest has never meant forcible 
seizure or cruel treatment. In old days when the 
Roman armies won victory over their enemies they 
subjugated them. This means that they put them 
under the yoke, like beasts of burden. When the 
people were too many to place a literal yoke on 



10 THE ROMAXCE OF COXQUEST. 

their necks, two spears were set into the ground 
and to these uprights a third spear was held or tied 
crosswise. Then all the defeated, men. women, and 
children, had to bow their heads and pass under 
in token of submission. In the ancient davs con- 
quest was often accompanied with cruelty, torture, 
and mutilation. Thousands were torn from their 
homes and settled as colonies of prisoners in other 
lands. One has only to look at the Assyrian sculp- 
tures to see how captives had their eyes put out 
or their limbs chopped off. or were driven in chains 
like wild beasts to hard labor and slaverv. In 
Rome, war-captives were used as prev for the lions 
in the arena, or as gladiators who fought and killed 
each other to amuse the crowd on a holidav. 

No such story is that of American conquest. 
First of all. we must have righteousness on our side. 
" Then conquer we must 
When our cause it is just," 

is in our national song. Ours is indeed a brilliant 
record of conquest through valor and diplomacy, 
but unaccompanied by the atrocities of ancient 
or niedi.vval warfare. Furthermore, the American 
idea of conquest means moral responsibilitv. gifts to 
the conquered of the best that the conquerors can 
bestow, the blessings of peace, plenty, equal rights, 
just laws, education, and such participation in social 
and political rights as may be possible. 



tt'ESTJl'.-lA'D r//£ CO('/i:S£ OF EMPIRE. i/ 

In reality, ours has always boon a discovcrino", 
a colonizing, and a conquering nation troni the 
moment of its birth. Our fathers had first to gain 
their own freedom and then to defend not only their 
own frontiers, but to send out expeditions beyond, 
to win their way against hostile Indians, or against 
other claimants of land which the States considered 
their own. In reality, we bought our way, paving 
for what we got. France, Spain, Great Britain, 
Russia, Mexico, were all given money, or a full 
equivalent, for what we got from them. 

The United States also sent out exploring expe- 
ditions to find new lands, to unveil coast lines, and 
make the world better known to its inhabitants. 
Liberia was established in Africa. Commodore 
Wilkes revealed to the nations an Antarctic conti- 
nent. Our brave sailors have gone near to the north 
pole. In many Asiatic and African countries and 
in the islands of the Pacific, American missionaries 
and teachers went out in numbers exceeding those 
of regiments. These, as well as our merchants 
and mariners, have carried the name and fame of 
America abroad. Nothing can restrain the pushing 
ardor of the Anglo-Saxon, who believes that God 
formed the earth to be inhabited. 

After the Civil War and consolidation, peace came, 
a double dutv was put upon the nation of tirst paci- 
fviuLT and then educatino- the redmen, and of raisina^ 



1 8 THE ROMANCE OE COXQL'ESJ'. 

up the black citizens to the appreciation of their 
riQ:hts. With all our faults and shortcominos as a 
nation, we have honestly striven to do this. 

The spirit of American conquest — using the 
word in the old meaning — was incarnated in 
George Washington. He was, in a twofold sense, a 
surveyor of land and of nations. Washington, the 
engineer and statesman, educated mainly outdoors 
and among men, was far-sighted enough to see that 
on this continent the old Latin ideas were to give 
way before Anglo-Saxon ideas and institutions. As 
a true Ens:lishman and Viro^inian, he was olad to 

o o o 

lead a company into Pennsylvania and Ohio to 
dispute the claims of the French, w^hich he believed 
were not righteously founded. 

During the Revolutionary War, when Indians 
became hostile foreigners,. Washington despatched 
General Sullivan into what was then, 1779, "the 
Far West " of New York, to assert American claims 
against the Six Iroquois Nations. During his presi- 
dency, he sent Generals St. Clair and Wayne to 
maintain our rights against the British and red- 
men in the Northwest. He himself personally 
visited the waterways and roads of western New 
York and Virginia, paying great attention to the 
opening and development of the West. He quickly 
discriminated between Anglo-Saxon ideas, repre- 
sented by Great Britain, even when her king was 



WESTWARD THE COURSE OF EMPIRE. 1 9 

foolish and hot-hcaclcd and Parliament was wrong, 
as against the F'rench, who, like the Spanish, Portu- 
guese, and Italians, represented Latin notions, which 
were behind the age, and therefore unworkable in 
the New World. He taught " Citizen Genet " and 
the world a lesson, while also showing Americans 
that they must be neither French nor English, but 
throw off the colonial spirit of dependence and 
become American. 

Then, as his latest and best gift to the American 
people he issued his farewell address, now a classic. 
In this he pointed out that the interests of Europe 
or the Mediterranean nations were not ours, and 
that we had problems of our own. We had noth- 
ing to do with their scheme of " the balance of 
power," on wdiich modern European politics are 
founded. He warned us not to enter into any en- 
tangling alliances, to avoid and keep out of all 
schemes of conquest and territorial aggrandize- 
ment, — at least until both the country and its in- 
stitutions were thoroughly consolidated and matured. 
His great idea was to see his country free from polit- 
ical connection with every other country, indepen- 
dent of all, and under the influence of none. He 
was, in the fullest sense of the word, a great and 
true American. He liked Americanism, without 
any hyphens. 

Wisely have our people and statesmen heeded 



20 THE ROMANCE OE CONQUEST. 

his words. Even in 1898, tliat wonderful }'car full 
of events which have turned the world inside out 
and shifted history from the Atlantic to the Pacific, 
the American people did not and will not depart 
from the true idea of Washington, even though 
they extend their domain and set up democratic 
institutions in the Pacific. 

The American is by true inheritance a soldier, 
but a soldier of righteousness. The Puritans, first 
in Holland and then in Britain, believed in necessary 
war as an instrument of divine justice. Colonists 
from man}^ countries in Europe and representatives 
of various races came to these shores and have been 
fused into one grand American composite. Yet 
those who laid the foundations, planned the struc- 
ture, and formed the ideas under which our nation 
has grown, were men who asserted the principle of 
personal freedom. They read the open Bible and 
interpreted it for themselves. They believed in the 
right to punish or depose their rulers when these 
were not faithful. Like Cromwell and the British 
people, thc)^ believed in strong nations helping the 
weak and oppressed peoples. They held to the 
Hebrew and Puritan principle that war might be 
employed as the instrument of God for justice and 
righteousness. Washington's maxim was " In time 
of peace prepare for war." 

Furthermore, they believed in asserting true man- 



WESTWARD THE COURSE OF EMPIRE. 2 1 

liness. They would not allow the bully to rage, or 
the tyrant in church or state to have his own way. 
Without virility and personal courage, they consid- 
ered all other gifts and graces vain. So from Mas- 
sachusetts to Georgia, Puritan, Hollander, Cavalier, 
Huo-uenot, and all believers in sfood 2:overnment, liv- 
ing as they did betwixt the ocean and the Indian, 
between the land forces and the fleets of hostile 
Europeans, were bred to the use of arms. They 
had before them the example of the great mother- 
land, of whom Shakespeare says: — 

" This England never did and never shall 
Lie at the proud foot of a conqueror 
But when it first did help to wound itself." 

But, when Thomas Dekker wrote the lines in " Old 
F'ortunatus," 

" And though mine arm should conquer twenty worlds, 
There's a lean fellow beats all conquerors," 

did he have in his mind's eye the long and lank 
figure, whom Europe has so often caricatured as 
tall, strong, and wiry, without rotundity, but not 
lacking avoirdupois, "Uncle Sam " .'^ 



CHAPTER II. 

FROM LEXINGTON TO STILLWATER. 

THE American colonial soldier was a young man 
from the farmhouse or the town dwelling. In 
politics, before the Declaration of Independence, he 
was a loyal Englishman, standing on his rights as 
Enorlish law had defined them. If at Lexino^ton the 
Minuteman had to fight the king's troops, who first 
fired on him, he went the next day and took afifi- 
davit that he was a law-abiding citizen, defending 
himself against the lawless military that had inter- 
fered with his rights on the king's highway. The 
Continental soldier resisted revolution from without. 
He took this name, because he was more and more 
interested in what all the colonies did in union, and 
less in what the king's ministers were pleased to 
dictate. Devout though he was, he had a new idea, 
or rather an old one, which was always latent 
in the Hebrew commonwealth and the Christian 
church before Latin domination and absolutism 
grew up. It was the idea of a state without a 
king and a church free from politics. He even 
believed in good coinage without the use of the 
divine name. 



FROM LEXINGTON TO STILLWATER. 23 

In his state militia regiment, the soldier of '76 
was usually a hero in homespun, without much idea 
of uniform. Only slowly did he come into rigid 
discipline, and that for the sake of the cause. The 
musket used by him in the national warfare was 
more apt to be his own gun, which had hung on 
pegs over the fireplace, with which he had shot 
birds, squirrels, deer, and bears. His home, by the 
Delaware or the Merrimac, was a plain building 
of logs or timber, with a well-sweep and woodpile 
outside, and indoors an open fireplace furnished 
with iron pothooks and andirons, with a living 
room in which were wooden settle and chairs. 
Over the mantelpiece stood candlesticks and a 
few books, which were pretty apt to be of solid 
character. Above, on the wall, or set on deer 
horns, was his firelock, which, with his trusty axe, 
was his familiar tool. 

When the Continental army of regulars was 
formed, the men wore buff and blue, cloth of the 
latter and trimmings of the former, with top-boots, 
knickerbockers, and woollen stockings. Metal but- 
tons, though comparatively new things, were plenty 
on cuffs, shirt, and front. Over his coat and waist- 
coat were two broad straps crossed diagonally. 
These held up his cartridge box and bayonet scab- 
bard. On his head was a three-cornered or cocked 
hat with cockade or pompon of red, white, and blue. 



24 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

His powder-horn, for loading and priming, was 
carved with sentiments, dates, scraps, history, sta- 
tistics, or geography — his true "horn-book." His 
musket was a smooth bore, with a wood or iron 
ramrod. The cock held a piece of flint, which 
struck upon a steel fender and threw sparks at the 
priming powder in the pan below. Hearty and 
healthy, alert, potent, brave was the young Minute- 
man and Continental. Most of the civil leaders and 
military officers of the Revolution were young men. 

Until regular army firearms and bayonets were 
imported from Europe, mostly from the Netherlands 
and France, the ordinary soldier in the ranks knew 
very little about a bayonet. The rifle was first in 
use among the Pennsylvanians, Swiss and Germans. 
It was superbly developed in Kentucky. Morgan's 
riflemen and sharpshooters were recruited almost 
wholly in the region where the Swiss and Germans 
from the Palatinate had settled. Our gallant 
Marine Corps was the first part of the armed force, 
or permanent military establishment created by law. 
It is thus the oldest part of the war service of the 
United States. 

The conflict of arms between the years 1775 and 
1783 was a civil war between kinsmen who spoke 
the same language. It was hard work for the Brit- 
ish king to get natives for his work, and he had 
to hire foreigners. If in the American army were 



FROM LEXINGTON TO STILLWATER. 2$ 

many who did not talk English well, there were in 
the royal forces Hessians and Indians who could 
not speak it at all. About forty thousand loyalists, 
or people who served King George, left our borders 
for Canada, and living there, developed that region. 

After the Declaration of Independence, the scene 
of war was transferred from the neighborhood 
of Boston to the region of Manhattan Island. A 
great British fleet and army under Lord Howe 
entered the Hudson River, to separate New Eng- 
land from the other colonies and then meet Bur- 
goyne coming from Canada. Thirty thousand 
splendidly armed and equipped British and Ger- 
man soldiers tried to surround and capture eigh- 
teen thousand Americans, most of them raw militia 
without guns or supplies. 

The British plan of campaign was to march an 
army down the Hudson valley from Canada and 
unite forces on Manhattan Island, cutting the thir- 
teen colonies in half, and thus quickly ending the 
war. Washington's strategy was to keep the two 
armies separate, by drawing Lord Howe's forces 
southward ; and Washington succeeded even in 
disaster. The two British hosts were never united, 
and the colonies were never separated. This is the 
whole story of the war. 

In the battle of Brooklyn, August 27, 1776, the 
brave young men of the Maryland line bore the 



26 THE ROMANCE OE CONQUEST. 

brunt of the British attack. They were over- 
whehned by superior force. Washington reheved 
Putnam and his nine thousand men, and in a fog 
escaped with his army across the Hudson. Losing 
an important fort through a deserter's treachery and 
the assault of the Hessians, Washington retreated 
to New Jersey with his remnant of brave men. 
He crossed the Delaware on the Sth of December 
at Trenton and reached Pennsylvania again, the 
state where his earliest, longest, and most glorious 
service had been, or was to be. 

When Christmas Day dawned, it was still dark 
night with the cause of freedom. Neither New 
Englanders nor New York Dutch folks then cele- 
brated the birthday of Jesus. The former had their 
Thanksgiving festival in November, and the latter, 
Santa Claus Day, December 6. But the Germans, 
whether Hessians forced to fight for King George, 
or the older makers of Pennsylvania, from whom 
we have borrowed the Christmas tree, until it is now 
national, always made much of Christmas. Among 
the soldiers there was much hilarity and carousing. 
Washington knew this and resolved to cross the 
Delaware again and attack Colonel Rahl's Ger- 
mans. His Massachusetts men from Marblehead 
pushed the boats through the floating ice. The 
Pennsylvania colonel, Jehu Eyre, Washington's aid, 
directed the general movement, and the successful 



FROM LEXINGTON TO SlILIAVATER. 2/ 

crossing of the ice-choked river was more wonder- 
ful than the battle itself. With scarcely the loss of 
a man, Washington captured a thousand Hessian 
prisoners, plenty of arms and ammunition, infusing 
a novel sort of Christmas joy all through the new na- 
tion. The prisoners, sent among their Pennsylvania 
German kinsmen, who could talk their language, had 
their eyes opened, and many of them deserted. After 
the war many more remained in or came back to 
America, where among their descendants are to-day 
thousands of fine families. Our brilliant cavalry 
leader, General Custer, was the grandson of a Hes- 
sian. 

Then grandly Philadelphia's young men, led by 
the " free Quakers," Colonels Jehu and Manuel Eyre, 
rushed to the aid of Washington. Lord Corn- 
wallis, a gay fox-hunter, having hastened across 
New Jersey to catch Washington and his raw 
reenforcements, waited over night at Trenton with 
only the Assinpink creek between the two camps. 
He expected to " bag " his game in the morning. 
He had left part of his force at Princeton, where, as 
we shall see, one of the decisive battles of the Revo- 
lution was to be fousfht. But in the nioht, leavinc: 
his watch-fires burninor Washin"ton moved around 
to the eastward, over an old and shorter road, but 
now frozen hard. As the morning sun arose, his 
advanced guard was on the crest of the hill near 



28 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

Princeton. The regiment or two of redcoats on 
their way to Trenton met the Americans. The 
brave British lads marched up, fired their volley; 
then, with a cheer, they rushed upon the Americans 
and drove them flying. 

At this moment Washington appeared in fiery 
valor. With the soldier's splendid enthusiasm, and 
knowing that if beaten the American cause was lost, 
he led his men, veterans and Philadelphia militia, to 
the charge. He plunged into the smoke and rode 
up to within thirty yards of the British firing line. 
For a few minutes, invisible and liable to be shot 
from either side, his officers were anxious enough. 
Then the wind blew away the cloud. There he 
stood unscathed, making a living picture, which 
Trumbull the painter transferred from reality to 
canvas. Mainly through the bravery of the Phila- 
delphia troops and artillerymen, the battle became 
a great victory. In this conflict Colonel Jehu Eyre 
was Washington's aid. 

Drawing off his troops to Morristown, New Jer- 
sey, Washington spent the winter there. He had 
won his point in keeping the British scattered. In 
the spring, officers from France, Holland, Germany, 
and Poland came over to help us, among whom 
were the French Marquis de Lafayette ; the Dutch 
naval officers. Commodore Dillon and Captain 
Joyner, and the army men. Colonel Dircks and 



FROM LEXINGTON TO STILLWATER. 29 

Bernard Romans ; the Germans Baron cle Kalb and 
Baron Steuben, the Pohsh Count Pulaski, and others. 
To meet Lord Howe's fieet and army at New 
York, General Burgoyne had come down from 
Canada through the valley and waterway of Lake 
Champlain, Lake George Valley, and the Hudson 
River; but through the activity of General Philip 
Schuyler, who cut off his supplies, his forces were 
nearly reduced to starvation. The failure of the 
expedition to Oswego, the defeat of the Hessians 
at Bennington by the militia of New Hampshire 
and Vermont, the American success in the fiercely 
contested battle of Oriskany in the Mohawk Valley, 
— one of the bloodiest conflicts durinof the war, — 
compelled Burgoyne, after fighting battles at Bemis 
Heights and Stillwater, to surrender his entire army 
of six thousand men. The total loss of the British 
was about ten thousand, and their plan of campaign 
was completely ruined. 

Thus New England and New York were left un- 
vexed by British steel or keel. Within two centu- 
ries, into the domain bounded by that Empire State 
which was born in 1777, four powers had come and 
three had gone. In 18S0, when the people of the 
First Reformed Church of Schenectady celebrated 
their bicentennial anniversary, a colossal banner, 
quartered in green, orange, red, and white, represent- 
ing the turtle, the totem of the Iroquois ; the pelican 



30 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

feeding her young with bosom-blood, the emblem 
used by William the Silent ; the British lion ; and 
the American eagle, told the romance of conquest 
in graphic symbol. 

In the South, after fighting the battle of Brandy- 
wine and another at Germantown, in both of which 
the Americans were beaten, the British army settled 
down quietly in Philadelphia. Washington went 
into winter quarters at Valley Forge. 



CHAPTER III. 

THE NAVY IN THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR. 

IT is generally supposed that in the Revolutionary 
war our liberties were won entirely by the army 
on land. Yet it is even more probable that, from 
1775 to 1783, there were more Americans fighting 
for their country on the seas than there were on 
shore. It was not the victories of the Continental 
troops which made King George sue for peace, so 
much as it was the captures of British ships and 
the injury to British commerce wrought by our 
men-of-war and privateers. 

Although the war of independence opened with 
spirit and was carried on with courage and self- 
devotion, yet there were great fluctuations in pa- 
triotism and in the size of the army, as well as 
in the sums of money spent for defence. The high- 
water mark of the national spirit was reached in 
those efforts which compelled the surrender of Bur- 
goyne. Then, both Americans and Europeans 
thought the war would end, but it did not. Disas- 
ters to our arms followed, which made the public 
spirit droop, until it looked as though we should 
have to depend upon Frenchmen to win our liberties 



32 THE ROMANCE OE CONQUEST. 

for us. The American army was very large at the 
beginning. In 1776 there was probably as many as 
ninety thousand militia and regulars, on paper at least, 
and nearly fifty thousand were actually under arms, 
but in 1 78 1 the number had fallen to about fourteen 
thousand, and the money paid annually for mili- 
tary support had decreased from $21,000,000 to 
$2,000,000. 

With dissensions in Congress and in the state 
legislatures, the people discouraged and tired of the 
war, it is probable that had it not been for our navy's 
influence upon British opinion, we could not, even 
with Bourbon aid, have won our independence. 
But with our privateers and men-of-war at sea cap- 
turing hundreds of British vessels, marine insurance 
in London rose to forty and even sixty per cent. 
In one year only forty out of four hundred British 
vessels engaged in the African trade escaped the 
clutches of the Americans. In another year, half 
the trading fleet between Great Britain and the 
West Indies was taken. As matter of fact, it was 
the clamor of the British merchants and their 
pressure upon the government which compelled 
King George to make peace. 

Beside the Continental or national navy, most of 
the states had their own ships and fleets, Massachu- 
setts, Pennsylvania, and South Carolina leading. 
The Bay State commissioned during the war about 



THE NAVY IN THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR. 33 

six hundred privateers, and her own vessels probably 
outnumbered those of the national navy. South 
Carolina had the heaviest ship afloat that ever, 
before 1812, sailed under the American flag, though 
unfortunately she was captured by the British. The 
Pennsylvanian, Hydcr Ally, fought one of the most 
brilliant battles of the war. 

Our men went to sea as soon as hostilities opened 
at Lexington, and began destroying British com- 
merce in the African and West Indian waters. The 
Tories were also very busy. In one year they had 
as many as six thousand men serving the king in 
privateers, which in six months brought into port 
142 prizes. The most active naval year was 1777, 
when as many possibly as eight hundred captures 
were made on one side or the other. It is believed 
that durino; the whole war there were about five 
thousand naval war episodes, including captures, 
armed encounters on the coast or in the rivers, or. 
bloody battles at sea, in which about three thousand 
prizes were captured from the enemy. 

At the beginning of the war, under John Adams, 
the great nationalizer, thirteen frigates, named after 
the different states, were ordered to be built. The 
chief object at first was defence, and to intercept 
supplies for the British army, but after the Declara- 
tion of Independence, the purpose was offensive as 
well as defensive. Then, not only were the Conti- 



34 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

nental armies and militia to be supplied with cloth- 
ing and munitions of war, but the enemy was to be 
weakened as much as possible. Both objects were 
grandly accomplished, for most of the cannon, mor- 
tars, and powder used in our army was made for us 
in Great Britain and captured by our sailors. 

After the British had left Boston, Captain Mud- 
ford in the Franklin captured a ship that had on 
board fifteen hundred barrels of powder, intrench- 
ing tools, gun carriages, and other stores. In one 
prize Captain Jones found ten thousand British 
suits of clothing. In another. Commodore Hop- 
kins captured eight out of ten ships which were 
being sent with men and stores to Georgia. An 
entire fleet was fitted out in Boston harbor by 
stores meant for the British army in New York, 
but captured on their way. The great head- 
quarters of our privateers from 1775 until 1781 
was at the Dutch island of St. Eustatius in the 
West Indies. 

"Maine" has become a synonym with the begin- 
ning of hostilities in three of our wars, British, 
Barbary, and Spanish. The first Lexington on 
the seas was, like the opening battle on land, " a 
rising of the people against a regular force, and 
was characterized by a long chase, a bloody struggle, 
and a triumph." In this the armed schooner Mar- 
garetta was captured. May 11, 1775, near Machias, 



THE NAVY IN THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR. 35 

in Maine, by an enterprising party of forty young 
men. Washington issued commissions to vessels 
to cruise in Massachusetts Bay, and intercept the 
British supply-ships. Captain Manly in the schooner 
Lee at Marblehead took the English brig Nancy 
and three other store-ships, which helped finely to 
supply the Continentals with munitions of war. 

Although for the United States to begin naval 
war with so powerful a country as Great Britain 
was like " an infant taking a bull by the horns," 
yet with Hercules's precedent of success. Congress 
began equipping a navy, and made Esek Hopkins 
of Rhode Island commander-in-chief. Gradually 
our little cruisers got out to sea and captured not 
only prizes, but even British vessels of war. Yet it 
was very difficult to create a navy, in the real sense 
of the term, and as we now understand it. Owing 
to the suddenness of the war and the total check to 
commerce, thousands of sailors had enlisted in the 
army or entered as privateersmen. This took away 
so many of our seafaring people that the national 
navy could not be easily manned. Nevertheless, 
Captain Paul Jones secured and drilled a crew, and 
in the United States sloop of war Providence took 
sixteen prizes. Captain Whipple, with one ship, 
captured ten merchant vessels in a fleet of fifty. 
Captain Biddle in the Andrea Doj^ea took so many 
of the enemy's armed vessels and merchantmen, 



36 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

putting prize crews on cacli, that when he came 
back from his cruise, only five of his original crew 
were with him, the places of his own sailors being 
supplied by volunteers from among the prisoners. 

To show how British plans were often upset by 
our sea-rovers, we may state that within a few weeks 
of 1776, about five hundred men of one of the best 
corps in the British army were, with all their equip- 
ments and stores, captured by our little ships of 
war. These were for the most part light vessels 
armed with from five to twenty guns, four, six, or 
twelve pounders. The benefit of these captures 
was twofold. They not only weakened the enemy, 
but they gave Congress so many prisoners, that the 
British could not look- upon our men as rebels only 
and refuse to exchange on equal terms, but were 
obliged to treat them as equals. 

The Reprisal was the first American man-of-war 
to get to Europe, arriving in France in 1776 with 
Dr. Benjamin Franklin as passenger. The doings 
of the Providence, Lexington, Andrea Doi'-ca, 
Defense, Lee, and other vessels caused intense sur- 
prise and indignation in England; for people trav- 
ellino: from London to Holland or France ran the 
risk of capture by American privateers. With the 
Q:reat thorouohfares of the sea thus threatened, 
marine insurance rose to an enormous amount. All 
England was so alarmed that some of the great 



THE NAVY IN THE REVOLU'IIOXAKY WAR. 37 

county fairs were not held, and freights were sent 
to the continent in French ships. 

The Andrea Doi^ea, Captain Robinson, after 
carrying a copy of the Declaration of Indepen- 
dence to St. Eustatius, received, on November i6, 
1776, the first salute ever fired in honor of the 
American flag by a foreign power. Five days after- 
ward, Captain Isaac Van Bibber, in The Baltimore 
Hero, captured an English brigantine just outside 
the harbor. On her way home the Andrea Doj^ea 
captured the Raee Horse, an English man-of-war, 
that had been sent out to capture her. Captain 
Robinson brought his prize into the Delaware River, 
but when the British fleet came in, this gallant ves- 
sel had to be burnt to save her from the enemy. 

In fact, all along our coast and in the Hudson and 
Delaware rivers, there were battles or skirmishes, 
whenever a British cruiser appeared or attempted 
to land. On lakes George and Champlain, flo- 
tillas of boats were built and armed, and a battle 
fought October ii, 1776. The American vessels. 
Royal Savage, Revenge, Liberty, Lee, Congress, 
Washington, Trtimbull, with eight gondolas, in all 
manned by six hundred men and carrying ninety 
guns, which fired at one discharge six hundred and 
forty-seven pounds, met with the British force of 
thirty fighting vessels. A hot fire of several hours 
was the result, in which about a hundred were killed 



38 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

and wounded on both sides. This battle on Lake 
Champlain was renewed the next day by General 
Arnold, who fought with great bravery. Though 
the Americans lost eleven vessels, and the affair was 
disastrous, much credit was gained our arms by the 
obstinacy and bravery of our men. 

In 1777 we had something like a regular navy, 
though at the assault on Fort Mifflin in the Dela- 
ware, by the British squadron, our men were 
obliged to evacuate the work. The eneniy got 
possession of the river, from Cape May to Phila- 
delphia, and several of our ships were burned to 
prevent them from falling into his hands. The 
British vessels were blockading our ports and it 
was difficult to get 'the national ships at sea. This 
was the year when the stars were first added to the 
stripes in our national flag. It is claimed that 
the first American vessel to fly the striped flag of 
the Continental Congress in foreign waters, and to 
salute it with cannon, was the brig Nancy, late in 
July, 1776, whose captain, while at St. Thomas in 
the West Indies, heard of the Declaration of Inde- 
pendence, signed a few days before. The first to 
float the starry flag on a regular American man-of- 
war in alien seas was Commodore Paul Jones of 
endless fame. 



CHAPTER IV. 

FROM SARATOGA TO YORKTOWN. 

BENJAMIN FRANKLIN went to France as 
envoy of the Continental Congress, and there 
made many friends. When asked in Paris about 
the success of the American republic, he always 
answered smilingly, Ca ira (it will go). These 
words, afterward taken as the name of French 
warships and privateers, became a cheery cry of en- 
couragement when things looked dark. The phrase 
is still used by the French people. 

And it did go. The Bourbon king and govern- 
ment, in the hope of regaining Canada, and in order 
to humble Albion their foe, recognized our country, 
saluted our flag, which then had thirteen stripes but 
no stars, lent us three million dollars, gave us two 
million dollars more, and agreed to help us with an 
arniy and a fleet. The German Baron Steuben, a 
superb drill-master, reached Valley Forge, and by 
his diligence and pains changed a mob of militia 
into a splendid army. 'Soon, at Monmouth, for the 
first time in the war, a regular pitched battle be- 
tween two well-organized armies was to be fought. 

39 



40 THE ROMAXCE OF COXQUEST. 

No war can be carried on without money. Rob- 
ert Morris, the Philadelphia banker, provided " the 
sinews of war" by personally collecting money 
and pledging his own credit. He was the great 
financier of the Revolution. Another friend of 
Washington and our country was the Philadelphia 
German " Baker General " Christopher Ludwick, 
who set up ovens, made good bread in the camps, 
and otherwise improved the food of our soldiers. 

When the French fleet sailed to America, the 
British were forced to leave Philadelphia, and fif- 
teen thousand of them started to go by land across 
the Jerseys. On the way to Monmouth hundreds 
of Hessians deserted. A fierce battle was fought, 
and then Washington retired to the line of the 
Hudson River. 

Meanwhile the Iroquois Indians had taken the 
side of the British, and in central New York and 
Pennsylvania devastated the country. They made 
raids in the Mohawk, Schoharie, and Wallkill valleys, 
and massacred the people at Wvoming and Cherry 
\'alley. On the other hand, in Illinois and Indiana, 
Captain George Rogers Clark drove the British and 
their red allies before him, held the territory, and 
thus oave solid o-round for the Continental Con- 
gress to claim this region at the peace of 1 783. 
Toward the end of the vear 1778 the British cap- 
tured Savannah. In midsummer of 1779 General 



FROM SARATOGA TO YORKTOWN. 4I 

Anthony Wayne performed the most brilHant feat 
of the whole war. By a bayonet charge, he took 
Stony Point on the Hudson. After this, with the 
exception of the episode of Arnold's treason at 
West Point, the awful winter sufferinor at Morris- 
town, and Arnold's raid in Connecticut, there were 
no military events of importance in the North, ex- 
cept Sullivan's expedition into the lake country of 
New York. 

Arnold and Montgomery's expedition in Canada 
and the invasion of an Indian wilderness in 1779 were 
like making war in a foreign country. The latter 
was beyond the line of coast settlements, and the 
roads following the Indian trails had to be chopped 
through the woods and made wide enough for the 
artillery. The expedition was a necessity, in order 
to prevent further Indian incursions and to stop a 
destructive " fire in the rear." It was decided to 
destroy the Indian settlements. 

Washington ordered General Sullivan to march 
from Easton on the Delaware to Wyoming on the 
Susquehanna, and thence northward, while a bri- 
oade of General James Clinton moved from Otseeo 
Lake southward to join Sullivan. 

No other state in the Union has such a series of 
waterways, salt and fresh, inland and oceanic, as 
New York, which was the real centre of the war, 
and contributed 43,600 soldiers, in this respect 



42 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

being surpassed only by Massachusetts. Right in 
the heart of the commonwealth is a wonderful lake 
region. Beginning with Onondaga, we have a 
dozen of these sheets of fresh water, most of them 
so long and narrow that they are called " finger 
lakes." All lovely and beautiful, they lie directly 
over beds of salt or above intervening strata, under 
which is the deposit of an ocean that dried up ages 
ago. How these lakes were made, whether by the 
scooping and scouring action of glaciers, or by the 
melting out of the salt caverns, and the breaking 
of the rocky shell above them, thus letting in the 
water and making deep the troughs on the earth's 
surface, is not known. Among these lakes the 
Six Nations of the Iroquois lived. 

The march of Sullivan's united forces besfan 
August 26, 1779. On the 29th the big battle of 
Newtown, near Elmira, was fought and w^on. Then 
the Indian villages on Cayuga and Seneca lakes, 
with their grain fields, orchards, and long houses, 
were destroyed. After going as far as Canandai- 
gua, the army of thirty-five hundred men returned, 
having so devastated the Indian region that the 
Iroquois could never again during the war give 
serious trouble. They retreated to Canada, and 
there disease and famine reduced their numbers 
terribly. Six American counties are named after 
Sullivan, the brave soldier of Irish descent. On 



FROM SARATOGA TO YORKTOWN. 43 

our side of the boundary line the name of Brandt, 
the Indian chief, whose warriors raided the val- 
leys of New York and Pennsylvania, is a synonym 
of cruelty and terror. On the other stands his 
statue, and he is honored. The war between the 
New York frontiersmen and the Tories, Indian and 
British, was prolonged, bitter, and bloody. Only 
one other state, Massachusetts, excelled New York 
in the number of enlistments or soldiers in the field. 

In the South, although the British forces had 
taken Charleston on the 12th of May, 1780, the 
" swamp fox," Marion, gave them much trouble. 
The redcoats marched inland to Camden. There, 
on the 1 6th of August, they won a victory; but in 
October the triumph of the Kentuckians at King's 
Mountain changed the whole face of affairs. The 
American highlanders, living on the borders of 
North and South Carolina and in Kentucky and 
Tennessee, had formed a body of rough riders, 
and quickly marching eastward attacked their foes. 
Although the latter were partially equipped with 
breech-loading arms, among the first employed in 
warfare, and had bayonets, the rough riders, who 
had neither, though they knew their rifles well, won 
a splendid victory. 

General Greene of Rhode Island began to be 
master of the situation, for he led Cornwallis on a 
lively chase after him into Virginia. Morgan and 



44 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

his riflemen gained the battle of Cowpens. Then, 
although at Guilford Court House, Cornwallis drove 
back the Americans, he had to retreat and so began 
marching toward Petersburg, Virginia. Greene, with 
an army of only two thousand men, but helped by 
Marion, Sumter, and Pickens, won victories at Cam- 
den and Eutaw Springs. 

Durino- all the time of the Revolution the Dutch 
were our friends. They recognized us and lent us 
more money even than the French did, helping 
us also with ships and men. At the island of St. 
Eustatius, in the West Indies, on November i6, 
1776, they were the first Europeans to salute our 
flag of thirteen stripes. They supplied liberally 
our privateers and men-of-war, so that probably 
one-half of the regular equipments and ammuni- 
tion which came from Europe to the Continental 
army were imported through the Dutch at St. Eus- 
tatius. Indeed, the British government thought it 
so necessary to destroy this place of aid and com- 
fort to Americans that Rodney's big fleet was sent 
to the West Indies, instead of having him go to the 
help of Cornwallis, who badly needed assistance. 

General Greene having recovered the Carolinas, 
and La Fayette having pressed him hard, Cornwallis 
was forced to retreat to Yorktown, where he forti- 
fied himself. The French fleet under Count de 
Grasse had arrived, and "the sparkling Bourbon- 



FROM SARATOGA TO YORKTOIVN. 45 

nieres," as the French soldiers in white and red 
were called, were encamped at Lebanon, Connect- 
icut, where Washington often took counsel with 
" Brother Jonathan," as Governor Trumbull was 
called. The French wanted to attack Canada, 
hoping thus to regain it for themselves; but Wash- 
ington preferred, even after war was over, to have 
English instead of French neighbors. So he planned, 
with the aid of our French allies, to march south to 
Yorktown and capture Cornwallis. 

Havino: French and Dutch financial aid and 
promises, Robert Morris was able to collect money 
for the expedition. The men in buff and blue and 
their allies in white and red moved together to the 
head of the Chesapeake Bay. Here they took ships 
to Yorktown. Rodney, having left Cornwallis in 
his trap, captured St. Eustatius, with all its Dutch 
and American stores, its two thousand American 
sailors, and twenty-six American privateers and war 
vessels. He wasted his time on the beach, auction- 
eering off the spoils, instead of coming to help 
Cornwallis, who, after three weeks of siege, sur- 
rendered. 

Although this was practically the end of the war, 
nearly two years of inaction and waiting were nec- 
essary before the peace treaty was signed. While 
our Continental army lay at Newburg, such was 
the dissatisfaction with Congress that a plot was 



46 THE ROMANCE OE CONQUEST. 

formed to establish a monarchy, but tlie Dutch loans 
of money deposited at Cornwall came in good sea- 
son to pay off officers and troops, and keep them 
contented until the peace treaty was signed. On 
April 19th the army was disbanded, the war of the 
Revolution lasting exactly eight years. 

Thus ended the existence of the Continental sol- 
dier, who stood for something much more valuable 
than either the money or the Congress of the same 
name. In the course of the war the quality of the 
men composing the Congress gradually deteriorated, 
while the paper money grew so worthless that a bag- 
ful of it was necessary to pay for a dinner or the 
grooming of a horse. The old slang phrase, " Don't 
care a continental," referred to a bit of pasteboard 
called money, and not to the brave soldier in buff 
and blue. 



CHAPTER V. 

THE STARS AND STRIPES IN THE MEDITERRANEAN. 

WHEN, in 177S, the French became our alHes, 
tlie marine policy of the United States was 
greatly changed. Instead of trying to build ships at 
home, under great difficulties, heavier expense, and 
with larger chances of capture by the British before 
they were launched, it was now possible to build or 
buy war vessels abroad. The splendid ship Alliance, 
constructed at Salisbury, in Massachusetts, was 
named to commemorate our friendship with France, 
and became the favorite of the nation. Since her 
day there has always been a ship in our navy named 
like herself. Other vessels were the Confederacy, 
the Hague, Queen of France, Ranger, Gates, and 
Saratoga. Captain Paul Jones, in command of the 
Providence, twelvti guns, harried the Irish coast and 
then crossed over to the English waters to alarm 
the enemy at home. The next year, 1779, he was 
given a larger command, and a project was made 
for making a descent upon Liverpool with a body 
of troops commanded by La Fayette, but as nothing 
came of this, Paul Jones went on board the Bon 

47 



48 THE ROMANCE Ofi CONQUEST. 

Homme Richard, which was named in compliment 
to Dr. FrankHn. 

This ship was, in its way, an old curiosity shop. 
It was as strangely manned as it was built, for the 
variety of its people suggested a rag bag or a crazy- 
quilt. The ship was quite old, built many years 
before as an Indiaman, and had one of those high, 
old-fashioned poops that made the stern look like a 
tower. The whole vessel resembled an enormous 
Japanese junk. Six old 1 8-pound cannon were 
mounted below and a battery of 12-pounders was 
put on the main gun-deck, while on the quarter- 
deck and forecastle were eight 9-pounders, mak- 
ing a mixed and rather light armament of forty- 
two guns. 

Except the few American officers, the crew was 
made up of English, Irish, Scotch, Welsh, Germans, 
Swedes, Norwegians, Portuguese, Spaniards, and 
even Malays. The 135 marines on board were ex- 
pected to keep the sailors in order, but were about 
as much mixed as to nationality as were the sea- 
men. Indeed, the Bon Homiiic RicJiard of 1779, 
with its complement of 380 souls, presented in 
miniature a picture of the various kinds of peo- 
ple that are being made into American citizens 
to-day. Nevertheless, with this ship and company, 
Paul Jones kept the eastern coast of England in 
terror during many months. Families along shore 



THE STARS AND STRIPES IN THE MEDITERRANEAN. 49 

buried their silver plate, and both the military and 
marines were kept in a state of constant drill and 
expectation, Jones took about twenty-five prizes, 
one of which, curiously enough, was a brigantine 
named the May/lower, which he captured near the 
place whence the Pilgrims, in 1609, fled in their 
boats from bishop-ridden England over to Holland. 

More wonderful to relate, Jones with his rickety 
old ship captured one of the finest vessels in the 
British navy. The Serapis was a double-decked, 
fifty-gun ship, new and strong and fast. She 
mounted on her lower gun-deck twenty i8-pound- 
ers, on her upper gun-deck twenty 9-pounders, and 
on her quarter-deck and forecastle ten 6-pounders. 
Her regularly trained crew consisted of 320 men, 
fifteen of whom were Lascars, or natives of India. 
The Serapis had yellow, the Richard had black 
sides. 

The two men-of-war, the Serapis and Countess 
of Scarborough, were convoying the Baltic fleet of 
forty-one ships. Of the vessels in Jones's squad- 
ron, the Richard fought the Serapis alone. 

The battle began about dark, but by and by the 
moon rose, and toward eight o'clock the two ships 
were near enough to open fire. Although the Amer- 
icans were fighting against a greatly superior force, 
yet Paul Jones had infused his own spirit into his 
men, and they went cheerfully to their quarters. 



50 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

At the very first broadside two of his old i8- 
pounders burst, blowing up the deck above and 
killing or wounding nearly all the men below. This 
caused the heavy battery to be deserted, so that 
now there was to be a fight between a 12-pounder 
and an i8-pounder frigate. According to the naval 
axiom of those days the 12-pounder frigate could 
never hope to win. So certain was the English 
commander of his speedy victory that, when the 
two vessels got foul of each other, Captain Pearson 
called out, — 

" Have you struck your colors?" 

The answer immediately came back, " I have not 
yet begun to fight." 

The ships were lashed together and the com- 
bat continued to rage. Down below the 18- 
pounder guns of the Serapis soon blew in and blew 
out large pieces of the old ship Richard's sides, 
until the British balls beat only the air, but on the 
upper gun-deck the Americans were pouring in 
shot and grape, while aloft in the tops their musket- 
men swept the decks and cleared the crow's nests 
of the Serapis with their fire, until all the British 
got below deck. Boldly climbing out on the main- 
yards of the Richard, the Americans dropped hand 
grenades down through the hatchways of the Sera- 
pis, by which they exploded the loose ammunition 
which the powder boys had carelessly left uncovered. 



THE STARS AND STRIPES IN THE MEDITERRANEAN. 5 I 

By this calamity twenty men were killed and thirty- 
eight wounded, or in other words nearly sixty 
persons disabled. 

In this curious night battle the English were all 
fighting with the heavy cannon below, while the 
Americans were working the upper-deck guns and 
small arms. The Richard was on fire several times, 
but the flames were put out. When, however, it 
was reported that she was sinking, the one hundred 
or more British prisoners on board the Richard were 
released to save their lives. One of these got on 
board the Scrap is and informed Captain Pearson 
that the Richard \\:is sinking. The English leader, 
expecting to take his enemy, called the boarders 
with the idea of ordering them on the Richard's 
deck, but seeing the Americans all ready to repel 
the attack the pikemen retreated. Meanwhile the 
English prisoners on the Richard were set to work 
at the pumps. 

Both ships again caught fire, and warriors had to 
turn firemen. After this the American cannonade 
began to increase and that of the Scrapis to slacken. 
About one hour after the explosion the British flag 
was struck. As not one of his men would expose 
himself to the fire from the Richard" s tops, Captain 
Pearson hauled down the colors himself. 

This terrible battle lasted nearly four hours. 
The Richard was so nearly knocked to pieces that 



52 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

her upper deeks and j^ooj) were almost ready to fall 
into the gunroom below, all except a few supports 
being shot away. On fire most of the time, she was 
now sinking. Yet by removing the pow^der from 
the deck, and keeping men at the pumps all night, 
the flames were got under at about ten o'clock next 
morning. During the day the wounded were re- 
moved to the Scrapis, and about nine o'clock of the 
25th the Bo)i Ho)]i)uc RicJiard wcwi down bow fore- 
most. In this awful slaughter probably one-half 
of all that were engaged were killed or wounded. 
Paul Jones rigged up jury masts on the Scrapis, and 
with his two prizes got into the Texel, in North 
Holland, on the 6th of October. 

The Hollanders were delighted with this victory, 
and the praises of Paul Jones were sung from one 
end of the Dutch United States to the other. The 
sentiment of the republic against Great Britain 
ripened, and sympathy with Americans deepened, 
until at last the Netherlanders became our allies 
and friends and declared war against Great Britain, 
lending us money and otherwise giving us aid. 
When I was in Amsterdam in September, 1S9S, 
after seeing Queen Wilhelmina inaugurated in the 
Nieuwe Kerk, I heard the people in the street sing- 
ino- their old historic son^s, and amono' them " Hier 
komt Paul Jones aan" (Here comes along Paul 
Jones). 



THE STARS AND STRIPES EV THE M ED I TERR AN E AX. 53 

The year 1779 was marked by much naval 
activity. There were numerous naval battles and 
captures of prizes. A great expedition of twenty 
vessels, with fifteen hundred soldiers, was despatched 
from Massachusetts to diskxhjfc the British who had 
a strong post ui)on the Penobscot River. These 
light ships, however, were not able to contend with 
the heavy British frigates, and the expedition came 
to disaster and caused naval enterprises to cease 
for some time. Furthermore, the British were so 
embittered against our privateers that they took two 
methods of annihilating, if possible, the American 
marine. They refused to exchange any more of the 
seamen which they had captured. They thus 
accumulated in England a large body of prisoners, 
who were kept at Dartmoor and other well-guarded 
places until the war was over. On the other hand, 
they authorized the employment of no fewer than 
eighty-five thousand men in their navy, to make 
sure of annihilating ours. 

Nevertheless, on June 2, 1780, there was a terri- 
ble battle of two hours and a half, a real " yard-arm 
enfraoement," between the Tmmbull and the Watt, 
the former having thirty guns and the latter thirty- 
four. In the way of a regular cannonade this was 
thought to be the severest battle in the naval war 
of the Revolution. Soon after this, the Saratoga 
fought the Charming Mollic and captured her. 



54 THE ROMAXCE OF COXQUEST. 

This victory was gained b}' the pike, Lieutenant 
Joshua Barney leading the boarders, and overcom- 
ing on the CJiarmiug jMoIHcs deck a British party 
nearly double his own. Later on the Trumbiill 
was captured by the British vessels, the Iris and 
the General Monk. 

The Hydcr Ally was a Pennsylvania state ship, 
under command of Lieutenant Joshua Barney, and 
named after a Hindoo chieftain who in India had 
opposed his conquerors. 

It had been fitted out to keep the Delaware River 
free from British barges and small cruisers, and to 
convoy ships in and out the waters around Cape 
May. Barney captured the British privateer, 
named the Fair American, and putting on board a 
prize crew sent her up the river. He next fought 
and took the General Monk, a twenty-gun ship. This 
action was thous^ht to be one of the most brill- 
iant that ever occurred under the American flag, 
for the Monk was heavier and larger and carried 
9-pounder guns, while the Hyder Ally had only 
6-pounders. 

The regular naval warfare came to an end under 
Captain Manly, who on our side may be said 
almost to have begun it, for this gallant officer 
commanded, as we saw, the schooner Lee, which 
on November 29, 1775, captured the British brig 
Nancy and other store-ships. 



THE STARS A.XD STAVPES IN Tf/E MEDITERRANEAN. 55 

It is a brilliant story, that of our little navy 
during the Revolutionary War. But as " life with- 
out letters is death," so unless a story is well told 
it is not known. It is no wonder that the averaoe 
American has a very hazy idea, if any at all, about 
the great work done and the decisive influence 
upon results, which our fathers on the sea w^-ought 
during Revolutionary days. 

We must never forget the heroes — Hopkins, 
Wickes, Conyngham, Biddle, Nicholson, Manly, Bar- 
ney, Whipple, O'Brien, Robinson, Paul Jones, Barry, 
and others, beside the French and Dutch captains 
— who helped us. Nor should we fail to remem- 
ber the gallant men of the shore and the seaports, 
and the marines, who, thouQ^h not known, did their 
part to serve their country. One who looks over 
the register of names in our navy to-day, and along 
through its history, w^ill find that certain families, 
like the Nicholsons, Rodgers, and Perrys, have con- 
tributed a large number of competent and gallant 
of^cers, who in the naval service have shed lustre 
upon their country. With not a few their line of 
service is ancestral, beginning even back in the 
Revolution. 

There were many prophetic voices concerning 
the United States of America. Van der Capellen, 
one of our many steadfast friends, declared that 
the Teutonic race in crossing the Atlantic gained 



56 THE ROMAXCE OF CO.VQUF.ST. 

pdtoncv o{ hvo liuiulrcd years of progress. The 
Spanish niinistcr in London, in 1783, used words 
that are worth reealling. He said: — 

" The federal repubhe is born a pygmy. A day 
will come when i( will be a giant, even a colossus, 
forniitlable in these countries. Lib^rty of con- 
science, the facility of establishing a new popula- 
tion on inimense lands, as well as the advantages 
of a new government, will ilraw thither farmers and 
artisans from all nations. In a few \ears we will 
watch with griet the tyrannical existence ot this 
same colossus." 

How truly fullillcd in iSqS! 

The little bab\' ho\ SimcMi Holiwir, destined to 
be the liberator of Spanish .America, was forty 
days old when the treaty between the two luiglisli- 
speaking nations was signed. 



CIIAPTl'R VI. 

FROM CONKKDI'-KATION TO CONS 11 TU'IION. 

Al*" ri'IR the Revolutionary War several years 
of misery and distress followed. The nation 
created by the Declaration of Independence of 
July 4, 1776, was a headless republic, a mere league 
of states. They could hold together as lon<;- as 
there was war, but broke into (|uarrellin<;- sections 
as soon as the pressure of foieii;n hostility was 
removed. I''ur()i)eans, even hhi<;iishmt'ii, laughed 
at the idea of " federal government " ever being 
successful on a large scale. P^or a little scrap of 
land, among the mountains of Switzerland, it might 
work. Possibly even m the swamj)y Netherlands 
it might do, but in a great country, with plenty of 
land, never. Large republics hitherto had been 
only ideals in imagination. So they watched to 
sec the American confederation fall to ])ieces. 

Congress had no i)()\ver and there was no centre 
of authority. With plenty of pajoer, but little gold 
or silver, nearly every one was in debt. There was 
no free interstate commerce, and affairs were drift- 
ing into a dreadful condition. In western Massa- 

57 



58 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

chusetts, which had a war debt of $4,000,000, things 
came to a head in what is called Shays's Rebellion. 
Many hundred excited farmers tried to stop all law- 
suits for debt. They claimed that the taxes were 
too heavy, the lawyers too extortionate, and the gov- 
ernors and senators too aristocratic ; that the capital 
ought to be removed from Boston ; and that plenty 
of paper money should be issued. The militia 
quelled the uprising, reforms were begun, and Shays 
fled. Being a revolutionary soldier, he lived in New 
York state under a government pension. His Mas- 
sachusetts mob gave a tremendous impulse to the 
movement for a better general government. 

The strong motive that held the states together 
was the claims of ownership in land, which several 
of them held and which they hoped to sell. They 
would thus get money for the payment of their 
heavy war debts. The states owed $26,000,000 and 
the United States $42,000,000. Massachusetts, Con- 
necticut, New York, and the Southern States, except 
Maryland, claimed the country west of them as far 
as the Mississippi River. Probably the reason why 
the other six states did not make a similar claim 
was that their western boundaries were already 
fixed. These were Rhode Island, New Hampshire, 
and the well-surveyed states of Pennsylvania and 
those touching it. New Jersey, Delaware, and Mary- 
land. The best-founded claim was that of New 



FROM CONFEDERATION TO CONSTITUTION. 59 

York, which had gained its right to the soil by well- 
attested treaties with its first owners, the Iroquois 
nation. No other state has so laro;e a collection 
of Indian deeds and wampum documents, given by 
red men for lands sold, which take the place of 
written and sealed parchments and papers among 
white men. 

New York led the way to the settlement of the 
question. She was soon joined by Massachusetts, 
Connecticut, and Virginia. They agreed to give 
the land northwest of the Ohio River and between 
the lakes and the Mississippi, in area larger than the 
Austrian Empire, to the United States, for the gen- 
eral welfare. Congress created a body of laws, very 
liberal in character, ruling out slavery, and all big- 
otry and political church ism. Thereupon began an 
emigration of people from the Eastern and Middle 
States into this splendid territory, out of which Ohio, 
Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, and Wisconsin have been 
formed. 

The pressing national want was "a more i>erfect 
union." In order to form this delegates were sum- 
moned from the different states, and a body of very 
able men convened in Philadelphia. After four 
months of debate in secret session, they agreed 
upon a written constitution. Thomas Jefferson was 
absent from the country, and Patrick Henry from 
the convention, but George Washington, Benjamin 



6o THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

Franklin, James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, were 
present and active. Soon the legislatures of nine 
different st^ites, led by Delaware and the number 
completed by New Hampshire, ratified the instru- 
ment, and it became the supreme law of the land. 

In making this compact, our fathers had before 
them the example of many ancient and modern at- 
tempts at self-government. They were filled witli 
the spirit of personal liberty inherited from the 
Germanic nations, and especially the Anglo-Saxons 
and English people ; but before their eyes was a 
living example of a federal republic, which had 
lived two hundred years, even though surrounded 
by mighty monarchies hostile to it. From the ex- 
perience of the united states of the Netherlands 
they learned, profited, and knew what to avoid. 
I^^rom the Dutch republic, more than from any 
other model or example, they borrowed much, while 
the defects of its constitution were avoided or im- 
proved upon. 

The new government began at Philadelphia, then 
the central and largest city of the. Union. Wash- 
ington chose Jefferson, Hamilton, Knox, and Ran- 
dolph to assist him in carrying out his duties as 
chief executive, and John Jay as head of the Su- 
preme Court. The first three formed what is called 
the Cabinet. Washington, " the anchor of the Con- 
stitution," was a strong Unionist, an American as 




"why do you do that?" said the president. 



FROM CONFEDERATION TO CONSTITUTION. 6 1 

against foreigners. He cared nothing about parties. 
Hamilton, who distrusted a democracy, was a Fed- 
eraHst. He held that a strons: national Qrovernment 
was the first necessity. Jefferson, who believed ar- 
dently in local and state rights, was a Republican- 
Democrat. It is said that Jefferson preferred only 
one legislative chamber, as in France. Washington 
thought there ought to be two, a Senate and House 
of Representatives. One evening at the supper 
table, Jefferson, tasting his tea, found it too hot. 
So he poured it into his saucer. 

" Why do you do that 1 " said the President. 

" To let the tea cool," said Jefferson. 

" Quite right," said Washington, "and just so we 
need two legislative chambers to give the judgments 
of legislators a chance to cool." 

The first thing to do was to get money. A duty 
was levied on all foreign ships and on much of the 
goods brought to our country. By thfs revenue 
tariff the treasury was filled and Hamilton at once 
began payment of the public debt. We owed Hol- 
land and France for money borrowed during the 
Revolution, and the home debt to our soldiers and 
civilian creditors was large. The different states were 
also to be helped in paying what they owed to their 
citizens. Eis^ht millions were soon disbursed, and the 
credit of the United States, thus securely founded, 
has been maintained through all our national history. 



62 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

The words " mint" and " money "came to us from 
the Latin, but those of "coin" and "bank "from the 
Dutch. One of the things most necessary in a new 
state or an old one is good metal money, that is, coins 
which everybody, and in every place, will recognize 
and accept at the value which is stamped upon them. 
Under the Confederation there were many kinds of 
paper and pasteboard which passed for money, but 
very little cash. Usually the money in one state 
was worth much less in another. 

Congress, in 1791, established a United States 
bank and in 1792 the United States mint. The 
one supplied paper and the other metallic money 
which were equally good in all the states. 

Hamilton fixed our system of coinage, the sim- 
plest and probably the best in the world. Our sys- 
tem is the decimal, based on units of ten, that is, 
ten mills make a cent, ten cents one dime, ten 
dimes one dollar, and ten dollars one eagle. This 
is substantially that of Holland, though with great 
improvements. Many countries of the world, in- 
cluding even Japan, have followed the American 
decimal system. 

The coinao-e of the different colonies had been 
based on that of England, but about the time of the 
Revolution had become much depreciated. So the 
Spanish milled dollar was then taken as the stand- 
ard. On this silver dollar, as on the pesetas which 



FKOM COX FEDKK. IT/OX TO COXSIITUTIOX. 63 

one still sees in our country, since the destruction of 
the Spanish tieet at Santiago, are stamped the Pil- 
lars of Hercules with liaos or streamers flvinor. This 
sign gradually became the dollar mark in American 
writing. It looks like the letter S with two perpen- 
dicular lines drawn through it, thus %. In spite of 
financial heresies, foolish notions about what money 
is and the old periodical panics, the wealth and 
credit of our country have continuously increased. 
Some day the financial centre of the world will be 
in New York or Chicaoo. 

Our first census in 1 790 showed that we had a 
population of nearly four millions, who lived on a 
strip of land about eight leagues wide along the 
coast of the Atlantic Ocean. Now this little coun- 
try was in danger of being used by the great Euro- 
pean powers for their own selfish purposes. Great 
Britain wanted to fight her big battles, without 
much regard to the petty little United States, or 
any other weak nation. When the British saw 
American ships carrying supplies to the French, 
they looked upon it as " blockade-running." 

The Scotch-Irish, in western Pennsylvania, did 
not relish the action of the government in laying 
taxes upon extracts of rye and wheat. These peo- 
ple, like their fathers in Hibernia and Scotia, were 
very fond of religion and whiskey. They refused 
to pay the imposts. They even beat or tarred and 



64 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

feathered the officers sent to collect revenue. One 
of the first uses of the United States army, under 
the Constitution, was its despatch by President 
Washington into western Pennsylvania to put down 
this first, but not last, manifestation of the liquor 
power in our country. The troops were mostly 
Pennsylvanians, and between the Governor's oratory 
and the presence of the militia the whiskey rebel- 
lion, in this primitive form, was soon put down. 

From the first Washington set the tone and gave 
the example of true Americanism. He was for the 
whole country, and not sections of it. He resisted 
every attempt of both natives and foreigners to 
check the growth of real patriotism. The French 
had risen up against their rulers, beheaded their 
king, and started a republic. " Citizen Genet " 
crossed the Atlantic to get American money and 
ships to help the French fight the English. Many 
of our people, in their gratitude to France for aid 
during our Revolution, were more zealous than wise. 
They rallied round Genet, and it looked as if one 
half of the Americans would be pro-French and 
the other half pro-British, and that we should be 
dragged into a war with England when we were 
poor, debt-burdened, and least able to defend our- 
selves. President Washington issued a proclama- 
tion of neutrality, which set the American precedent 
of taking no part in European quarrels. 



FROM CONFEDERATION TO CONSTFTUTION. 65 

This sliowcd that the Father of his Country was 
sometliing else tlian an Engiisli colonial gentleman. 
He was more, even a true American. Indeed, he 
was the first to rise above the colonial spirit into 
the broad idea of a new and grand American na- 
tionality. In 1795 he wrote to Patrick Henry: 
" ]\Iy ardent desire is to keep the United States free 
from political connection with every other country, 
to see them independent of all, and under the influ- 
ence of none. In a word, I want an American char- 
acter, that the powers of Europe may be convinced 
that we act for ourselves and not for others." 

Thus this wise and great man, who foresaw our 
national future, gave us, under God, the true prin- 
ciple of unity. Our fathers listened to his voice, 
pondered, took " sober second thought," and de- 
cided aright and happily for us. Instead of scat- 
tering and degenerating, our country began to 
consolidate and grow. The nation, obeying the 
true instinct of development, began to expand 
toward the West. A great stream of population 
moved over the mountain wall of the Alleghany. 



CHAPTER VII. 

THE MOVEMENT BEYOND THE ALLEGHANIES. 

A MIGHTY line of mountains, called the Ap- 
palachian chain, runs southwestwardly from 
Labrador, and forms the wonderful rock coast of 
New England, from Maine to Rhode Island. After 
Narragansett Pier there are no more rocks along 
the ocean front until we get to South America. 
Movino^ inward, the mountain line, by its westward 
trend, allows a great slope of land between the sea- 
beach and hiohlands and from Connecticut to Mis- 
sissippi. This in the eastern portion is a fertile 
tide-water region. In the western areas it is rich 
in grain and pasture lands, grottos and waterfalls, 
glens and passes. This line makes state boundaries 
between the Carolinas and Kentucky and Tennes- 
see, furnishing plateaus with some of the most in- 
viting highland soil in the country, and here and 
there gaps or natural gateways. These allow roads 
to be built throuQ-h and over from the east to the 
west, along which armies, freight and passenger 
trains can move. Some of them, like Cumberland 
Gap, are very famous. Through these passes high- 

66 



THE MOVEMEXT BEYOXD THE ALLEGHANIES. Gj 

ways were built at slate or national expense, and 
soon great lines of emigration moved over these 
roads. Various were the forms of vehicle that 
were built to accommodate the traffic. The famous 
Conestoga wagon was long and large, with high 
sides and stout canvas cover, projecting out behind 
and before. It thus served as a tent, which could 
be enlarged by opening the side flap. Thousands 
of families, men, women, and the stronger children, 
with their faces toward the setting sun, tramped by 
day and slept on the ground by night. In rainy 
weather they lived in the wagon, using it as a bed- 
room at night and kitchen or storehouse by day. 
Soon villages and towns sprung up, and inns lined 
the roads. 

In the evolution of the nation's system of trans- 
portation the Indian trails became first earth roads, 
with sections of plank or corduroy, then turnpikes, 
then iron and finally steel railways. 

Of all the gaps, that one between Albany and 
Schenectady, which formed the gateway into the 
beautiful Mohawk Valley, is the most important, 
whether for warlike strategy — as military men, 
from Frontenac in Montreal to Grant on Mount 
MacGregor, have noticed — or for business. Here 
the mountains drop down to within a few score feet 
in height, and a majestic river breaks through the 
wall of rock at Cohoes and joins the Hudson. At 



68 THE ROMANCE OF COXQUEST. 

this point of highest value in mihtar}' strategy was 
the eastern doorway and end of the Long House 
of the Six Nations. Through this gap tliousands 
of young and hardy emigrants now poured out from 
New England to seek more fertile land. 

This rush for land was mightily helped by Cupid. 
Love and enterprise promoted marriage and in- 
creased population. Often when a young man 
would propose to a lady friend or new acquaint- 
ance, immediately, should her answer be favorable, 
both would go to the parson's, be joined in wedlock, 
and on the same day set out for " the Black River 
country," or further west. Often, too, the young- 
men and marriageable maidens in the wagon cara- 
vans made love and were mated on the way. The 
church records of marriages at the stopping places, 
in Schenectady, for example, show how busy the 
dominies were kept in joining in wedlock young 
couples who were passing through and westward. 
Fat were the fees, for youth and hope are generous. 

From the Middle States, especially New Jersey, 
another line of people followed the Indian trails 
northwestward from Easton, which Sullivan's pio- 
neers had first chopped wide enough to admit the 
artillery. These two streams from the east, the 
middle, and the southeast, the Pennsylvania and 
the Yankee, met at Penn Yan, which they jointly 
named, each contributing a syllable. 



THE MOVEMENT BEYOXD THE ALLEGHAATES. 69 

There was no rest in Penn Yan, but onward went 
the home-seekers further toward the Mississippi 
and the Pacific. 

There was a famous and very popular song, 
wliich began : — 

" Oh, of all the mighty nations 
In the East or in the West, 
This glorious Yankee nation 
Is the greatest and the best. 

" We have room for all creation. 
And our banner is unfurled, 
Here's a general invitation 
To the people of the world. 

Chorus : " Come along, come along, make no delay, 

Come from every nation, come from every way, 
Our lands they are broad enough, don't be alarmed, 
For Uncle Sam is rich enough to give us all a farm." 

These people streaming westward in the North 
moved parallel with the grand procession begun by 
Daniel Boone in the South, which kept increasing. 
With axe and rifle they crossed Kentucky and Ten- 
nessee. Soon in the valleys of the Ohio and Cum- 
berland rose groups of log cabins, cleared spaces in 
the timber with smiling fields of grain in the bottom 
lands, and, not very much later, the church spire and 
the schoolhouse. These showed the beginnings of 
new states and the promise of the nation's sure 



70 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

expansion, within a few years, to the Mississippi 
River. 

When so much territory was to be occupied, it 
was highly important that a good system of land 
measurement and allotment should be formulated. 
Most of the old soldiers of the Revolution had been 
paid in land warrants. Many of the veterans sold 
these warrants for cash, but a large number of the 
young and strong became actual settlers on their 
own lands. The greatest danger, as history shows, 
is, that while every family may and ought to have a 
certain inheritance and participate in the benefits 
of landed property, yet sooner or later the soil gets 
into the hands of a few. 

In Europe, in place of the general landholding 
or common lands of the old Teutonic freemen 
through ancient times, the Middle Ages brought 
the tenure of serfs, and the noblemen ruled the 
country. In England, by a remarkable exception, 
the land law of the nobles became the land law of 
the people. In the United States the public lands 
were a fund for the use of all the people, a source 
of public revenue and a basis of national finance. 
They have also served as a means of effecting in- 
ternal improvements, such as canals, highways, and 
levees, for the building of great roads and railways, 
and, best of all, for the promotion of education. 
As early as 1784 Hamilton and Jefferson initiated 



THE MOVEMENT BEYOXD THE ALLEGHANIES. yi 

measures which laid the foundation of the present 
system of survey, known as the rectangular system. 
As Secretary of the Treasury, Hamilton in 1790 
furnished the basis of the present method of land 
administration. It seems curious that the best 
book in English on " The History of the Land 
Question in the United States" should be by a 
Japanese, Shosuke Sato, a fellow of Johns Hopkins 
University. 

It was Simeon De Witt, surveyor general of the 
State of New York, who first put in practice and 
carried out the details of that method of land meas- 
urement which, borrowed from the Empire State, 
has come into vogue over the greater part of the 
United States. Territory is divided into townships 
of six miles square, the lines running due north and 
south, with others crossing these at right angles. 
The townships are subdivided into sections of one 
mile square, or six hundred and forty acres. Each 
township contains thirty-six sections, or 23,040 acres. 
Even when hills, forests, broken or worthless land 
allow only a partial survey of part of a township, 
the sections are actually laid out and numbered 
from south to north and the ranges from east to 
west. 

Simeon De Witt's plan took the place of that one 
in the Ordinance of 1787 which had "hundreds" or 
squares of ten geographical miles and lots of one 



72 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

mile square. It is most probable that De Witt's 
system was imported from Holland and was of 
Roman origin. After his many years of labors 
and wanderings were over, De Witt named his own 
township at the foot of Cayuga Lake, Ulysses, and 
his place of residence, Ithaca. 

It is to be noticed that until 1820 this oreat mass 
of emigrants westward were native Americans, 
They were not Europeans. From 1770 to 1785 
there was no emigration from Europe worth speak- 
ing of. Until 1820 the number of immigrants 
averaged only about eight thousand people a year. 
Land was very cheap, and the terms of sale so 
liberal that settlers could often pay the price of 
their farms with the first crops gathered from their 
newly broken soil. All that a man needed, to get 
a whole square mile of land, was $331 in cash. 
The land cost only two dollars an acre. One need 
only deposit one-twentieth of $1280, which was the 
price of a section, and then one-fourth of $1280, 
including deposit, within forty days. The other 
three-fourths of the whole amount ($960) could be 
settled for within four years. Fees for application, 
surveying, etc., amounted to $11. 

So began the great American Exodus, properly 
following the Genesis of the Constitution. Often 
settlers formed great companies and bought millions 
of acres, taking up whole townships as fast as the 



THE MOVEMENT BEYOND THE ALLEGHANIES. JT, 

surveyors could locate. They bought on trust, and 
sold again for wheat, for lumber, or whatever the 
land would yield. Thus it was that true American 
settlers, natives of the soil, and not strange foreign- 
ers, first cut down our forests, bridged our rivers, 
and built up towns. In spite of malaria and home- 
sickness, of wild beasts and other " vermin," these 
stalwart Americans replenished the earth, and laid 
the foundations for larger advantages to their 
descendants. 

To-day the old virgin forests have disappeared, 
the beaver dams are forgotten, the trout brooks 
have narrowed or dried up, and the face of the 
country is changed almost beyond recognition. 
Yet the skilled eye can find the site of old leach- 
eries, ash pits, limekilns, lumbermen's camps, and 
other primitive forest industries, which showed 
how our grandfathers won their living in a wild 
country, getting food, money, and prosperity ; 
withal, often wasting, like spendthrifts, the re- 
sources of the soil. 

In the South the great event of 1793 was the 
invention of the saw-gin, by Eli Whitney, by which 
the seed was quickly separated from cotton-wool. 
Before his time a man could with his fingers and 
rollers clean about a pound of cotton a day ; or, 
with the Chinese whip and bow, a little more ; but 
Whitney's gin equalled in amount of work done 



74 THE ROM A ATE OF CONQUEST. 

that of three thousand pairs of human hands. The 
result of this invention was to make the raising of 
this vegetable wool the most profitable of all crops. 
Cotton covered hundreds of thousands of acres with 
snowy balls, riveted slavery upon the southern 
people, started hundreds of great cotton mills in 
New England, created a class interested in main- 
taining slave labor, and, above all, enormously 
increased our foreign trade. Whereas, in 1784, 
we had exported only three thousand pounds of 
cotton, we began within ten years after the inven- 
tion to export more than forty million pounds. 
Soon it was said, " cotton is king," for whereas 
many Asiatic and African countries had been sup- 
plying cotton, Americans by their inventive power, 
added to the peculiar adaptedness of our soil, had 
won away the culture and trade of the cotton plant 
so as to make it, for the most part, a distinctively 
American production. Now we supply not only 
Europe, but even Japan. Every year the value 
and demand increase for this wool that grows out 
of our soil. 

But while this Connecticut schoolmaster, sojourn- 
ing in the South, took the seeds quickly out of cot- 
ton, he gave us further seed of long troubles and of 
civil war, as we shall see. At first the cotton seeds 
were thrown away as useless refuse. Now, by the 
application of brain, steam, and machinery, they 



THE MOVEMENT BEYOND THE ALLEGHANIES. 75 

yield oil, soap, food for cattle, and material for fer- 
tilizers. Presto! By the magic of commerce, the 
reputation of the old countries and the fad for things 
foreign, cotton-seed oil, after a trip to Europe in 
bulk, comes back in bottles duly labelled, in Italian, 
as " olive " oil. 

The romance of the conquest by Americans of 
the forces of nature, for the subduing and replenish- 
ing of the earth, is a long story, for which we have 
not room in this volume. It soon became necessary 
for Congress to provide a Patent Office, where could 
be showm models of machines that would work, as 
well as for the storage of the much larger number 
that would not. 



CHAPTER VIII. 

WAR WITH FRANCE ON THE SEA. 

WHEN John Adams became President, in 1797, 
it looked as though we were to have war with 
France, because the French thought that, having 
aided us in our struggle against Great Britain, we 
oufrht to side with them. Yet Washinoton had 
proclaimed neutrality, and most of our fathers were 
with him. John Adams knew also, very well, as 
Washington and a majority of the nation, that the 
motives of the French in helping us had not been 
like those of the Dutch, — sympathy with our de- 
sire for freedom and hope of trade with us, — but 
that the object was to get possession of Canada and 
simply to do harm to Great Britain. John Adams 
had already plainly told Count Vergennes this. 
I-^urthermore, the American idea of a republic is 
something quite different from the French and 
Spanish-American notion. 

The anger of the disappointed French was soon 
expressed in open hostilities. They not only cap- 
tured our provision ships and sold them, but they 
insulted our envoys. Their impudence reached its 

76 



I FA A' WITH FRANCE ON THE SEA. yy 

climax when tliey demanded money of our govern- 
ment, threatening war in case their bullying claims 
were not acceded to. The Frenchmen who pro- 
posed this bribery were ashamed to come out openly 
with their own names signed ; so they resorted to 
the coward's device and sent the meanest of all 
missives — anonymous threatening letters. 

The reply of the United States Minister was in- 
stant. It was, " No ; no; no; not a sixpence." In 
this he was sustained by the whole American peo- 
ple, whose cry was, " Millions for defence ; not one 
cent for tribute." Mr. C. C. Pinckney, the envoy, 
had been an ol^cer in the Revolutionary War and 
a framer of the Constitution. He was ordered to 
leave France. From this time forth the world 
learned, as the Barbary powers, and even Great 
Britain learned, that the United States would never 
buy a dishonorable peace. Though the Americans 
love money, they love honor more. 

A tremendous wave of excitement rolled over the 
country. Two new songs were written, "Adams 
and Liberty," and " Hail, Columbia," which were 
sung from Maine to Georgia. Washington was 
again invited to take command of the army which 
Congress gave power to the President to increase. 

In our early history but one department of the 
government had the oversight of war both on land 
and sea. By the Act of Congress, April 30, 1 798, 



y^ THE RcUnXC/-: OF COXQUEST. 

tlie navy department was organized separately, so as 
to be no longer, as before, under the war department. 
By this time the keels had been laid for six war- 
ships, three carrying forty-four, and three thirty- 
ei2:ht cruns each. American naval constructors 
built the Uuiftd States, the Coustitutio)i, and the 
President^ on original models, and these heavy frig- 
ates proved to be among the most effective ships in 
the world. The Constitution is the most historic. 
The Pvi'sidcnt was the best and swiftest sailer, and 
tlie United States was the first vessel to get into the 
water under the present organization of the navv. 

To illustrate the methods of transportation in 
those days, the sheet copper, witli which the 
President was to be sheathed, was rolled at Canton, 
Massachusetts, and then transported in wagons 
drawn by oxen that carried the metal to Phila- 
delphia. In that city, at the foot of Swanson 
Street, she was launched on the loth of July, 1797. 

Of the three thirty-eight-gun ships, the Chesa- 
peake was by sailors considered unlucky. The 
Constellation was one of the handsomest of ships. 
The Congress proved to have been one of the 
oldest and the most useful in the whole navy, 
when her old age had come. 

On the nth of July, i 79S, the new marine corps 
was established by law, in place of the old one. 
Five days later, in the same vear, it was voted that 



/F.//v' WITH FRANCE ON THE SEA. 79 

the navy of the United States should consist of 
thirty active cruisers. About the same time Con- 
gress by law denounced all the treaties with France, 
because the French had begun depredations upon 
our commerce and made themselves our enemy. As 
war was looming up, Captain Richard Dale, in the 
Ganges, — the first man-of-war to get to sea under 
the new navy department, — was ordered to capture 
French cruisers on our coast or to recapture their 
prizes. At this time the new frigates were not 
ready, for our country was then very deficient in 
guns, naval stores, and spars. 

When the Constellation was able to get to sea, 
she was put under the command of Captain Thomas 
Truxton. The first vessel made a prize of by our 
navy was taken by the United States sloop of war 
Delaware, commanded by Captain Decatur, who 
captured the French privateer Le Croyable. The 
name of the prize was changed into the Retaliation, 
and she was put under command of Lieutenant 
Bainbridge. Pretty soon the frigate United States, 
under Captain Barry, got to sea. 

Now began the real education of our ofificers and 
the deposit of those traditions which are a part of 
the life of the service. There was no naval acad- 
emy then, except on the ship's deck, and our great 
commanders often began as boys of twelve. The 
Constitution, under Captain Samuel Nicholson, was 



80 THE KOMAXCR OF CONQUEST. 

also in commission by July 20, 1797. Then our 
war-ships convoyed fleets of our merchantmen 
safely between the West Indies and our northern 
ports. By the end of 1798 we had twenty-three 
ships of war atloat. The programme of naval en- 
largement became so popular that several national 
ships were built by subscription in different cities 
and presented to the government. 

The Retaliation did not have a long career under 
the American llag. She was captured by two 
French frigates, and thus both sides, French and 
American, had made captures and come out even. 
By the opening of the year 1799 we had twenty- 
eight war-ships afloat. Now came the time to test 
the merits of the new American heavy frigate, for 
this craft was of a novel type. Americans have 
always led the way in naval designs. 

When, on the 9th of February, Commodore 
Truxton in the Constellation, with a brave and 
eager crew, fell in with the French frigate Insiir- 
ocnte, the first heavy naval combat since the Revo- 
lution began. The Constellation suffered first the 
loss of her foretop mast, but after several broad- 
sides got where she could rake the enemy. After 
firing three broadsides through and along the hull 
of her enemy, she shot out of the smoke, wore 
round and was again ready with all her guns 
loaded to rake the Insiirgente from stern to stem. 



/r./A' IVrj'II FRANCE ON rilE SEA. 8 1 

The Frcncli captain, after a loss of seventy men, 
seeing his peril, struck his flag at 3.30 p.m., and the 
one hour's battle ended. 

The Constellation had but three men wounded. 
One man was run through by his own officer, for 
having flinched at his gun. The law of the battle- 
deck does not allow of cowardice, lest by the 
default of one the whole crew should be panic- 
stricken, and defeat be made certain. Years before, 
in the attack on Stony Point, one of Wayne's men 
suffered death at the hands of an officer and in the 
same way. This was for turning aside to load his 
musket when the general had ordered empty guns 
and cold steel. 

The first lieutenant of the Constellation, John 
Rodgers, afterward commodore, was put on board 
the Insurgente with eleven men to take the prize to 
St. Kitts in the West Indies. There were still 
173 of the French crew on board when it began to 
blow, and darkness coming on the work of trans- 
ferring the prisoners had to stop and the two 
ships separated in the darkness. With the decks 
still covered with the wreck of sails, spars, rigging, 
and splintered timber left by the battle, dead and 
wounded lying about and their blood running out of 
the scuppers, and the prisoners expecting to rise and 
recapture their ship, Rodgers's situation was awk- 
ward indeed. He kept the Frenchmen below and 



82 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

set armed sentinels during the three days. He 
finally brought the Insurgentc to St. Kitts, meet- 
ing the Constellation already there. 

This victory awakened tremendous popularity in 
favor of our navy. Lads and sailors pressed for- 
ward to enlist, and the young men of our best fami- 
lies were only too glad to get commissions as mid- 
shipmen. The government began a career of well- 
planned naval expansion. Captain Preble convoyed 
American vessels to the Dutch East Indies, Then 
the stars and stripes were first seen on an Ameri- 
can man-of-war east of the Cape of Good Hope. 
France having taken Holland, and being at war 
with England, the annual Dutch ship from Ba- 
tavia to Nagasaki could not sail under Dutch 
colors. So the American Captain Stewart took 
her to Nagasaki under our flag, and for the first 
time the sixteen stars and thirteen stripes were 
mirrored on the Black Tide of Japan. The people 
in the land of Tycoon and Mikado were much 
interested in the " flowery flag." 

Congress persevered in the work of building 
up a superb marine, and even six 74-gun ships 
were contracted for. It may be truly said that 
at the opening of the nineteenth century the navy 
made as brilliant a record as it has done at its 
close. The six heavy frigates were afloat, and there 
were altoorether in the West India waters or nearer 



IVAR WITH FRANCE ON THE SEA. ?,T, 

home twenty-five men-of-war, one of them being 
the old lusHro-aiic refitted. The cruisinu: fleet 
was divided into two squadrons, one under Com- 
modore Talbot, who had ten, and the other under 
Commodore Truxton, who had as many more. 
Nevertheless the seas were swarming with Gallic 
cruisers and privateers, and our commerce suffered. 
This was the era of the French " Spoliations." I 
could tell many " tales of a grandfather " who had 
experience of capture and loss. 

On the ist of February, 1800, Commodore Trux- 
ton, in the Constellation, fell in with the French 
frigate, Vengeance, with fifty-two guns and five hun- 
dred men. Putting on all sail, Truxton came up 
to hail the Frenchman, when the latter opened fire 
from his stern and port guns. A battle began 
which lasted from eight o'clock in the evening until 
one o'clock in the morning. Then the French 
ship, having lost one hundred and fifty men killed 
and wounded, drew off. The Constellation, losing 
her main mast, which went overboard, was unable to 
make chase. The Vengeance got into Cura9oa dis- 
masted and in a sinking condition. This battle 
added tremendously to the reputation of Truxton 
and our navy. 

Another brilliant action was the capture of a 
French privateer, the Sandwich, formerly of Eng- 
lish ownership, at Port Platte, by a party of seamen 



84 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

and marines in the sloop SaHy, led by Lieuten- 
ant Hull of the Constitution, who afterward com- 
manded this famous ship. Later the Insurgcnte 
sailed on a cruise. She must have foundered at 
sea, for nothins: was ever heard of her. This made 
the fourth ship of the American navy lost in this 
way. There were a good many minor conflicts at 
sea and captures of French privateers by our ves- 
sels during^ this naval war with France. Never- 
theless Napoleon Bonaparte saw that there was no 
real ground of hostilities between the two nations 
that had lately been allies. Overthrowing the gov- 
ernment at Paris, he became first consul and pro- 
posed peace. On the 3d of February, 1801, the 
treaty of amity with France was ratified by the Sen- 
ate, and a man-of-war, well named the Herald, was 
sent to the West Indies to recall all our armed 
ships. 

Thus ended this short and irregular war with 
France, in which our naval officers were trained 
to enterprise and action. This campaign was only 
the prelude to the splendid naval drama on the 
Mediterranean. 

No one saw more clearly than Napoleon the 
future of the American people. No one believed 
more surely in the time, not far away, when the 
United States should first be the commercial rival 
and then the superior of Great Britain. It is no 



WAR IV 1 711 FRANCE ON THE SEA. 85 

wonder, then, that as soon as this " man of destiny " 
came in power, he made peace with the United 
States. Furthermore, he was soon ready to sell 
out all French claims to territory in America. And 
so, to this Corsican dictator we owe it that our 
territory was doubled and our country began the 
policy of continued national expansion. When 
Washington died, in 1 799, Bonaparte ordered pub- 
lic mourning for him in France, though the British 
also lowered their flags to half mast. Our war with 
France was the first war under the new Constitution. 



CHAPTER IX. 

OUR NAVY IN THE MEDITERRANEAN. 

WHILE our country was so young and weak, 
it had not yet made its flag respected on 
the high seas, and especially in the Mediterranean 
Sea. A line of robber nations, from Egypt to the 
Atlantic Ocean, held North Africa and dominated 
the seacoast. These Barbary states were Tunis, 
Tripoli, Morocco, and Algiers. The pirates were 
Mohammedans, and thought they were doing God 
service in robbing Christian ships, making their 
crews prisoners, and then holding them as slaves 
or for ransom. They had heavily armed, fast sail- 
ing vessels, called corsairs, which swooped like 
hawks upon their prey. Thus they grew rich on 
their villanous work. Even strong European na- 
tions had to bribe these fanatical robbers. Our 
government paid the Dey of Tripoli many thou- 
sand dollars a year to allow our ships to pass his 
coast. Having no navy, we could not fight or de- 
fend ourselves. 

These Barbary powers at first, during the Middle 
Aees, had carried on this naval warfare for what 

86 



OUR NAVY IN THE MEDITERRANEAN. 8/ 

they called religion. Then finding such " religion " 
very profitable, they kept it up, for both their con- 
science' and pocket's sake. Before the Revolu- 
tion, our annual trade in the Mediterranean, which 
amounted to twenty thousand tons a year, was pro- 
tected by passes from the British government at 
London. After our independence was gained our 
young and weak nation had to guard against these 
new enemies — the piratical Moors. 

As in 1898, so in 1785, it was " the Maine " that 
began the war. A schooner of that name was cap- 
tured by the Dey of Algiers and her crew imprisoned 
as slaves. Other captures followed. In 1792 Wash- 
ington proposed a treaty with Algiers, which was 
to pay $40,000 as a ransom for the thirteen Ameri- 
cans then held captive, $25,000 as a present to the 
Dey on putting his signature to the treaty, and 
$25,000 a year annually. Admiral Paul Jones was 
given charge of the negotiations, but unfortunately 
he died at this time. Soon after this the Algerine 
fleet captured ten of our vessels, and in November, 
1793, there were one hundred and fifteen American 
prisoners in Algiers alone. Yet, although our fel- 
low-countrymen had been seized and worked in 
chain gangs as slaves, our country, instead of pun- 
ishing the rascals, kept bleating like a fat sheep. 
The government had to ask the churches and Chris- 
tian people to take up collections during hours of 



88- THE KOMAXCE OF COXQUEST. 

worship, to raise money to pay ransoms. Mean- 
while the proud thieves became more insolent and 
demanded more. 

The firing of salutes is the wasteful etiquette 
observed between ships of different nations and 
recognition of officers of high rank. It costs more 
every year to burn powder thus foolishly than it 
does to support Christian missionaries all over the 
world. In 1797 it was proposed, on the side of the 
Bey of Tunis, that a barrel of gunpowder should 
be given the Tunisian government for every gun 
fired in saluting an American ship of war. To 
this our envoy Barlow objected, though the Bey 
insisted upon it, because, he said, " fifteen barrels 
of gunpowder will furnish a cruiser, which may 
capture a prize and net me a hundred thousand 
dollars." The consul replied that " the concession 
was so degrading that our nation would not yield 
to it, — both justice and honor forbade, — and we did 
not doubt the world would view the demand as they 
did the concession." " You consult your honor," 
said he ; " I my interest ; but if you wish to save 
your honor in this instance, give me fifty barrels 
of powder annually and I will agree to the altera- 
tion." This treaty with Tunis cost us $107,000, 
and up to 1802 our diplomacy with these marauders 
amounted to over $2,000,000 — enough to have 
built twenty large frigates. Indeed, half of this 



OUR NAVY IN THE MEDITEKKANEAN. 89 

amount, properly invested in good American men- 
of-war and the pay of our brave sailors, would have 
saved us the degradation of handing over bribery 
money during many years, for then we should have 
had peace, without paying a single dollar for either 
tribute or ransom. 

As matter of fact our treaties with the Barbary 
nations amounted to nothing until we sent a naval 
force into the Mediterranean. For each one of the 
Mohammedan robbers demanded as much money 
as the others did, and during all the negotiations 
the United States were put on a level with Sweden. 
The more the barbarians were paid, the more they 
wanted. 

Mr. William Eaton, United States Consul at 
Tunis, accompanied our first squadron of four 
vessels and was presented to the Dey. He thus 
describes that ruler's private audience room, twelve 
by eight feet in size : " Here [in the narrow dark 
entry, leading to the room] we took off our shoes 
and entering the cave (for so it seemed) with small 
apertures of light, with iron gates, we were shown 
to a large, huge, shaggy beast, sitting on his rump 
upon a low bench, covered with a cushion of em- 
broidered velvet, with his hind legs gathered up 
like a tailor or a bear. On our approach to him 
he reached out his forepaw as if to receive some- 
thing to eat. Our guide exclaimed ' kiss the Dey's 



90 THE ROMAXCE OF COXQUEST. 

hand ! ' The Consul-General bowed very elegantly 
and kissed it, and we followed his example in suc- 
cession. The animal seemed at that moment to 
be in a harmless mood ; he grinned several times, 
but made very little noise. After standino- a few 
moments in silent agony, the American company 
left the den, without any other hindrance than the 
humiliation of being obliged, in this involuntary 
manner, to violate the second command of God 
and offend common decency." 

The little American frigate George Washington 
was in the harbor of Algiers in October, iSoo, when 
the Dey demanded of the American Consul the 
privilege of using this vessel to carry his ambassador 
to the port of Constantinople, with the customary 
presents. He threatened war, plunder, and devasta- 
tion unless his demands were satisfied. So weak and 
low had we become in the eyes of these barbarians, 
that the captain of the George Washington had to 
hoist the flag of Algiers at the main top and salute 
it with seven guns. However, this little war vessel, 
w'hich went to Constantinople, was the first to show 
the American flag in the Bosphorus, and thus the 
thirteen stripes and sixteen stars were reflected on 
the waters of eastern Europe. 

Yet no benefit came from our degradation. The 
Dey was a sharp bargain maker, declaring that the 
naval stores were not up to the mark. Instead of 



OCR iVAVY IX THE MEDITERRAXEAN. 9 1 

reckoning by the Christian calendar, he computed 
according to the INIohammedan years, and by the 
year 1S12 found our government deficient to the 
amount of $27,000, by which time we had paid 
about $379,000. 

When the Bashaw of TripoH found that the 
United States government had bribed the Dey of 
Algiers at a higher price than himself, he behaved 
like a dissatisfied small boy. This Oriental Oliver 
Twist clamored for more presents and money. 
These not coming when expected, he cut down the 
flagstaff of the American Consulate May 14, 1801, 
and began war. 

Finally our government took measures to protect 
American citizens even beyond the ocean. Captain 
Dale was sent with the three frigates, President, 
Philadelphia, and Essex, and the gunboat Entei^- 
prise. These arrived at Gibraltar in time to keep 
two Tripolitan ships of war from getting into the 
Atlantic Ocean to prey on our commerce. The 
presence of our navy had more influence in main- 
taining peace than if the frigate George Washington 
had come again laden with tribute. 

The first trial of prowess between the Turks and 
Americans was when the Enterprise fell in with a 
Tripolitan corsair, then out on a predatory cruise. 
The Turk, after fighting a while, struck his flag 
but hoisted it aoain, thinkintT to gain an advantage. 



92 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

After three hours' battle, the American fire had 
been so destructive that the Turkish captain threw 
his colors into the sea, and asked for quarter. Fifty- 
men on the pirate ship had been killed or wounded, 
while on the Enterprise was not a man hurt. Our 
men first attended to the wounded, and then threw 
the Turks' guns overboard, gave the ship a sail and 
spar, and allowed the crew to go back to Tripoli. 
Yet the Tripolitan captain's bravery, and even his 
wounds, did not avail with the Dey. He was placed 
on a jackass, ridden through the streets, and then 
given the bastinado. 

Our vessels blockaded Tripoli and kept the cor- 
sairs from coming out, but the Dey, caring nothing 
for his own people, would exchange no prisoners. 
He still held the American captives, hoping for 
large ransom. In 1802 another fine squadron, under 
Commodore Morris, kept up the blockade, but little 
was accomplished, and the Moors kept up their 
piratical activity. On August 26, 1803, the Phila- 
delphia captured the Meshboha, belonging to the 
Emperor of Morocco, but, on October 31st, while 
chasing a Tripolitan vessel, ran hard and high upon 
the rocks, where she was wedoed fast. ThouQ-h 
everything was done to lighten her, the ship could 
not be got off. No other American vessel was near 
to help, and under the attack of nine gunboats our 
flag was hauled down. The Americans were robbed 



OUR NAVY LV THE I\l EniTERRANEAhr. 93 

and |)liiiukM\'(l, and Ca|)taiii nainl)i"id<;e and his men 
WLTc thiown into piison. Ilu' I )ivan was highly 
elated and expected large ransom. 'Hiin^s looked 
dark for the y\mericans. 

Commodore Preble, one of the (nsl and greatest 
educators of the United States navy, was i)ut in 
command of the American forces in the Mediterra- 
nean. To prevent the Philadelphia from being 
refitted as a piratical corsair, Decatur, with brave 
officers and a picked crew of seventy men, boldly 
|)lanned to run in at night and set the frigate on 
fi re. 

This scheme was carried out on a moonlight 
night. Our men lay concealed on the ketch Lilrcpid, 
and the Turks, thinkins: the boat was a Maltese 
trading vessel, were completely surprised. Decatur 
sprang on board, leading his men. They cleared 
the spar deck by driving the Turks into the sea, 
and won complete victory after a struggle below. 
Then the combustibles were passed uj), the shij) 
set on fire in a dozen places, and soon masts and 
rigging made glowing columns and caj)itals of fire. 
Indeed, the Americans themselves barely escaped 
from the flames. The spirit of the United States 
navy rose high, and our merchant vessels, in conse- 
quence of the general war then prevailing in Europe, 
began again to " whiten the seas of the Old World 
with American commerce." 



94 THE ROMANCE OF COXQl'EST. 

On August 3, 1804, Coniniodore Preble, witli 7 
men-of-war, 2 bomb-vessels, and gunboats manned 
by 1060 men, bombarded the forts and fought the 
enemy's war-ships. In the harbor were 115 cannon 
mounted in battery, 19 gunboats, and 5 men-of-war. 
Besides the science and skill shown by Preble, 
his oi^cers, Decatur, Somers, Trippe, Bain bridge, 
Thorne, McDonough, Henley, Ridley, and Miller, 
won fame and distinction, while the Coustitutiou 
revealed her splendid qualities both as a sailer 
and a floating fortress. There were hand-to-hand 
fights, and 2 boats were captured by Decatur, which 
had on board 80 men, of whom 52 w'ere killed or 
w^ounded. With 1 1 Americans, Lieutenant Trippe 
boarded and captured another vessel having a crew 
thrice as large in number as his own. 

Several points were made prominent in this battle: 
first, the superiority of the American gunnery, and, 
second, the courage and effectiveness of our men in 
boarding. The muscular INIussulmans had always 
supposed that they excelled and were invincible with 
the pike and cimeter. Besides the three gunboats 
taken, three more were sunk, and the batteries were 
badly damaged. 

Other bombardments followed, but we had no 
land forces to reduce the fortified city, and the Dey 
still insisted on a ransom of $500 apiece for his 
prisoners. 



OUR NAVY IN THE MEDITERRANEAN. 95 

In the old naval warfare, and until well into the 
present century, great reliance was placed upon fire- 
ships, or floating mines, for sul^marine mines were 
at that time unknown. Captain Somers offered to 
take in a bomb-ketch close to the shipping and 
batteries and blow them up. The Intrepid was 
loaded with powder and combustibles, and called an 
" infernal," and great things were expected of this 
" hell-burner." But although manned by brave and 
cool men, the Intrepid blew up prematurely, and all 
on board perished. Whether by shots from the 
enemy, or by accident, or to avoid capture, is un- 
known, for no one survived to tell how or why. "A 
sad and solemn mystery, after all our conjectures, 
must forever veil the fate of these fearless officers 
and their hardy followers." 

The name of Somers became a battle-cry, and 
has been given to our ships of war. Had the 
Intrepid succeeded, there w^ould have been peace 
within twenty-four hours ; but since it failed, the 
barbarian ruler still hoped that the Americans 
would submit to capture and give ransom, rather 
than pay money for a navy so far from home. On 
the contrary, our squadron was kept up. 

Then came the affair of General Eaton, who, with 
a motley force, captured Derne, and the treaty of 
1805, which w^as of no special credit to our govern- 
ment. As a naval campaign, the war in the Medi- 



96 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

tcrrancan was, in its results, at least respectable; 
while as a school for the forming and education 
of the United States navy, these four years of ex- 
perience in the Mediterranean were of incalculable 
value, and later we shall see good results. 



CHAPTER X. 

DOUBLING THE NATIONAL DOMAIN. 

AMERICAN diplomacy really began with the 
mission of Franklin to France in 1776. Other 
envoys were despatched, such as John Adams, Silas 
Deane, and Henry Laurens. Dr. Franklin, by his 
wit and wisdom, by his eminence in science and 
philosophy, and by his unique and commanding 
personality, which attracted the attention of the 
Bourbon court, and especially of the elegant ladies 
of Paris and Versailles, made a signal success. He 
obtained from the French money, ships, an army, 
and loans, besides commissioning privateers and 
securing the services of John Paul Jones. One of 
the pleasant surprises to the American visiting 
France is to see so often the portraits of " Poor 
Richard." 

John Adams was successful, especially in Hol- 
land, where he secured recognition of the United 
States and loans of money. These, when paid up 
in 1829, amounted in principal and interest to 
$14,000,000. While our various American envoys 
were in Europe, much real sympathy with our 

n 97 



98 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

country was awakened. Not a few Frenchmen and 
Dutchmen made real personal sacrifices in behalf 
of American freedom; but in the great flock of 
European adventurers that offered to serve in our 
cause, and to accept commissions in the army, 
many, were worthless characters. Not a few duels 
were fought between French and American officers, 
for our men could not stand the aristocratic airs of 
these supercilious servants of the Bourbon and other 
monarchies. Congress was only too ready to com- 
mission these soldiers of fortune whom Silas Deane 
recommended ; but Washington did not like the 
policy' of employing many foreigners. He wrote 
that if our liberties were to be achieved, the war 
must be fought and the victories won by Americans 
if at all. As for Spain, we got no help from her as 
an ally, and it was well for us that we did not. The 
one European people that from first to last really 
sympathized with us were the Dutch, whose history 
was so much like our own. 

Our national diplomacy under the Constitution 
began when John Jay was sent by Washington, in 
1795, to make a new treaty, because the treaty of 
1783 had not been carried out properly by either 
party, British or American. Our people did not 
keep their word and pay their debts. On the other 
hand, the British government, besides hampering 
our trade with France, kept the Indians in hostility 



DOUIif.lNC ■rill': NATION A I. DOMAIN. gg 

to us, and would not i^ivc up llic forts ;dou^ tlic 
northern frontier, as had been promised. The 
treaty which John Jay secured was very unj)Oj)uhu" 
with our grandfathers, who were greedy enough in 
wanting to get more than they really deserved; while 
on their part the British tried to use us as their 
unwilling ally against TVance, and interfered unlavy- 
fully with our commerce. 

By the Jay treaty the eastern boundary of Maine 
was settled, our citizens recovered about #10,000,000 
for illegal captures by British ships of war, and 
the western forts held by l^ritish garrisons were 
surrendered to us. This was all very fine for 
our side, but to offset these advantacres our tradin<j: 
ships were shut out from Canadian ports, and placed 
under restrictions in the West Indies, while nolliing 
was said about impressing our sailors in the liritish 
navy, nor anything about neutrality, as between the 
French and British privateers, for the British gov- 
ernment refused to settle these matters. 

So a tremendous excitement ensued. Public 
meetinci^s were held denouncing: Washino^ton, At 
Boston, Jay was burned in efifigy, but was neverthe- 
less made Governor of New York for six years, and 
under his auspices slavery was abolished in the 
Empire State. Washington approved the treaty, 
because he thought it was the best which we could 
at that time obtain ; for weak nations could not 



lOO THE ROMANCE OE CONQUEST. 

tluMi, aiul i)crliaps cannot now, l)c treated on equal 
terms with niore powerful nations. Our country 
was puny, hut alive and growing, and unable as yet 
to compel the res}Dect of the great nations of liurope, 
then in conflict with each other. The War of 1812, 
which on the ocean gathered in for our heroes a 
sheaf of British fiags, was necessary to compel Great 
Britain to respect us. No one more than an Eng- 
lishman respects you when you beat him in a fair 
fight. 

When Jefferson became President, the capital 
had been removed from Philadelphia to Washing- 
ton, which was then a little village in the midst of 
a ten-mile tract of land covered with woods. In- 
stead of being built to face the future and the 
splendid city of to-day, the fa9ade of the capital 
confronted a little straggling village where the " old 
families" were supposed to live. 

The idea of having a capital in a district which 
had no vote in Congress, and in which no individ- 
ual could vote, in either state or national elections, 
without going home to his birthplace or residence, 
was borrowed from the Hague in the Dutch republic. 
Washington and Adams, who were the stadholders, 
that is, holders of power in place of American peo- 
ple, had imitated a little the manners and ceremo- 
nies of kings. President Washington had, especially, 
put on great state and dignity both at ol^cial recep- 



DOUIU.ING TI/E NATIONAL POMAI/V. lOI 

tions and at social balls, and in attcndin<>: and i^oin^r 
from church. The " Republican Court " was a scene 
of great splendor and dignity. 

As I have heard my grandmother and grand- 
aunts tell, President Washington would be driven 
in a coach and six horses to Old Christ Church, 
on Second vStreet, above Market, in Philadelphia. 
Dressed in black velvet, waited upon by his obse- 
quious lackeys and footmen, and driven by P^ritz, 
his famous Hessian coachman, he made a great 
show of pomp and splendor, which not only the 
boys and girls, but the ladies and gentlemen of the 
capital city, delighted in viewing. 

Jefferson, who had democratic ideas that emerged 
during the French Revolution, dressed more plainly 
and cared little for display, while at the same time 
fashions were tending toward the simpler style of 
to-day. Besides the great change from silk waist- 
coat, lace ruffs and wristlets, knee-breeches, silk 
stockings and silver buckles, men were beginning 
to wear trousers, and their coats and hats were more 
like those of our time. Jefferson carried his simpler 
manners and habits to the capital and in the execu- 
tive mansion. This was not the present White 
House, but one which had been occupied by Presi- 
dent Adams, and which was burned by the British 
in 1814. 

It was under Jefferson that the great expansion 



102 '/7//'.' ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

programme, now over a century old and yet unfin- 
ished, began to be carried out. A study of the facts 
shows that the thoughts of Americans " widened 
with the process of the suns." In colonial days a 
road had been made from Plymouth, nine miles 
westward, which there sto])ped, it not being then 
supposed that any regular travel further westward 
would ever be needed. In 1690 the village of 
Schenectady was spoken of as " in the far West." 
A hundred years later the rernoval of the capital to 
Washington was opposed as being " too far toward 
the setting sun." In Jefferson's time many able 
men shook their heads at the idea of the republic 
extending beyond the Alleghanies. Many also sup- 
posed that in time the different sections would break 
up into nations. Indeed, it is no wonder that good 
and wise men held these views, for then it took 
more time to go from Baltimore to Pittsburg than 
is now required to reach luu'ope, or to travel from 
California to I lawaii. P'rom San P^^ancisco one can 
reach the Philippines more easily and more quickly, 
than even the swiftest and bravest hunter could get 
from Philadelphia to the Mississippi River. 

Yet even while men were thus thinking and talk- 
ing, the very ones who believed in having a country 
no wider than two hundred and fifty miles were 
staggered with the proposition to buy the very heart 
of the American continent, between the Mississippi 



DOUBLING THE NATIONAL DOMAIN. IO3 

River and tlic Rocky Mountains. T^rancc owned 
this territory called Louisiana,, named by La Salle, 
its discoverer, after Louis XIV and his queen. 
Instead of being the district still retaining the name, 
it extended from the Gulf of Mexico to Canada. 
Out of this vast region watered by the Red, the 
Arkansas, and the Missouri rivers and their tribu- 
taries, over a dozen states and territories have been 
made. 

Napoleon Bonaparte had determined on ruling, 
if possible, all Europe, and on bringing even Great 
Britain under subjugation. For this gigantic task 
he needed plenty of money. Moreover, he feared 
the capture of Louisiana by the British fleet. So 
when the offer to sell was made, Mr. Jefferson, 
though not liking the idea of national enlargement, 
and stretching his constitutional power, as he him- 
self confessed, " till it cracked," bought a million 
square miles, or over six hundred millions of acres, 
at two and a half cents an acre, and Napoleon got 
$15,000,000. Thus all possible disputes with France 
were removed out of politics ; England would never 
control the Mississippi Valley; the great West be- 
came ours and opened to our settlers. The grandest 
river and valley on the continent, with the precious 
jewel of the Crescent City, came under the Ameri- 
can flag, then glistening with seventeen stars. Our 
national domain was doubled. 



CHAPTER XI. 

WHY A SECOND WAR FOR FREEDOM WAS FOUGHT. 

JEFFERSON'S plan of defending our Atlantic 
^ coast by a flotilla of little gunboats seems very 
amusing to-day when we think of the proud and 
powerful nations of France and Great Britain. 
These were then at war, and in their fighting they 
cared very little about the rights of smaller coun- 
tries. Each went so far as to forbid Americans to 
trade with the other. Great Britain demanded the 
right to stop our ships and search them, in order 
to get British sailors. Every man who could not 
prove his American citizenship was dragged away 
and forced to enter the British service. 

The success of the British, especially after Nel- 
son's victories and Trafalgar, had transformed many 
English captains into genuine bullies. Indeed, this 
is the usual effect of most successful wars, — to fill 
the victors with inordinate pride, — and it is one 
reason why war ought to cease from the earth. 
Several thousand men were taken off our ships in 
this way, and things seemed to be going on from bad 
to worse, when an event took place through which 

104 



W//V A SECOND WAR FOR FREEDOM JVAS FOUGHT. 105 

Providence taught our country and the American 
navy a bitter, but a very wholesome, lesson. It 
was the first and the last time that an American 
man-of-war was fired on without response. 

The United States frigate Chesapeake had sailed 
for Hampton Roads, and was hailed by a British 
war vessel Leopard. Officers came on board to 
muster the Chesapeake' s crew, to see if there were 
any of their sailors on board. This Commodore 
Barron refused to permit, or to allow his men to be 
mustered by any except their own officers. Notic- 
ing that the decks were littered up and the ship 
utterly unprepared, the British lieutenant returned 
in his boat to the Leopard. In a few minutes the 
British trained her guns and opened fire upon the 
Chesapeake. This was in time of peace and without 
provocation, for Commodore Barron had written a 
letter stating that he knew of no British deserters 
on his ship. Utterly unprepared, no reply with fire 
and shot to the treacherous bully could be made. 
The Chesapeake s crew were so unready that even 
the single cannon discharged was fired by an officer 
who carried in his hands a live coal from the cook's 
galley and placed it upon the powder of the touch- 
hole. The Chesapeake struck her colors, and the 
British took off three men, but let Commodore 
Barron return to Norfolk with his ship. 

Yet the moral effect of this affair was excellent, 



I06 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

and the ultimate benefit to the Americans very 
great. Very little damage had been done by the 
British cannon balls. The mist of rumor and exas- 
geration of the power of the British broadside were 
blown away, and for all time our navy learned the 
lesson of being always ready and effective. Now, 
no ships are neater, no crews are more vigilant, and 
no officers are in more constant preparation for the 
possibilities of action, whether the time be one of 
war or peace, than are those of the United States. 

But instead of going on to increase and perfect 
our navy, Congress foolishly passed laws called the 
Embargo and Non-intercourse acts, which forbade 
any American vessels sailing from our ports. By 
paralyzing our commerce, it was hoped that France 
and England would behave themselves. This was 
like cutting off one's own arm to make men respect 
you, instead of using it for defence. We lost time, 
trade, money, and ships. 

Nevertheless one good result sprang out of this 
suicidal policy. The stream of American energy, 
turned back by this dam, found outlet in another 
direction. Factories rose, and soon new wheels 
were turning. The New Englanders turned their 
attention to manufactures and labor-saving inven- 
tions. The Pennsylvanian, Fulton, launched his 
steamboat on the Hudson, and the Clermont moved 
without wind or oars against wind and current from 



IV//V A SECOND WAR FOR FREEDOM WAS FOUGHT. 10/ 

New York to Albany. The jDuffing monster scared 
some of the farmers, who thought that the devil was 
riding up the river on a sawmill. The fishermen 
and sailors were awed almost as much as the 
Indians had been, two centuries before, by Henry 
Hudson and his ship Half Moon. In the far 
Northwest Lewis and Clarke explored the Missouri 
River valley beyond the Rocky Mountains and 
down the Columbia River, which was first named 
after his own vessel, by Captain Robert Gray, who 
carried the American flag around the world. Soon 
steamboats began carrying emigrants and stimulat- 
ing traffic on the Ohio, the Mississippi, the western 
rivers, and tHe Great Lakes. A few years later 
the first ocean steamer crossed from Savannah to 
Europe, bearing the American flag. 

When James Madison, often called " the Father 
of the Constitution," was chosen President and came 
into ofifice, thousands of American ships were rotting 
at their wharves. Their owners waited impatiently 
for the liberty of commerce. Misled by what the 
British minister at Washington had promised, that 
they would be unmolested by British men-of-war 
if they traded only in English ports, they started 
out on the ocean, turning the cold shoulder to 
France. But American captains soon found that 
England would not cease searching our ships, nor 
did Napoleon keep his word any better. When, 



I08 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

further, as was believed, British agents stirred up 
Tecumseh, an Indian chief of Ohio, who united 
the savage clans from Florida to Michigan to break 
up the white settlements, General William Henry 
Harrison marched into Indiana. At Tippecanoe, 
in 1811, he defeated the embattled redmen. 

Other incidents came to aggravate the bitter 
feelings between the United States and Great 
Britain. Commodore John Rodgers and other 
naval captains believed that our men and ships 
could meet the British on the seas with fair pros- 
pect of success. Having confidence in the merits 
of the American long gun and the heavy frigate, 
they determined to leave nothing to Chance. They 
constantly drilled their men both at cannon and 
carronades, and with cutlass, pike, and pistol. 
They determined, when they got a chance, to put 
an end to the abominable habit of the searching 
of our ships by the heroes of Trafalgar, whom long 
success had made insolent. 

Gradually a party was formed in this country 
which had representatives in Congress, whose creed 
was that war with Great Britain would consolidate 
the union of the states, and thus benefit the country 
by developing its resources. The cry went up for 
" free trade and sailors' rights." This meant freedom 
to trade with any country that would trade with us, 
and protection of American seamen against seizure. 



IV//Y A SECOND WAR FOR FREEDOM WAS FOUGHT. 109 

Naval fashions of tliat day called for a vast area 
of canvas on the sailing ships, with enormous flags 
and streamers. One British vessel, the Gtierriere, 
had her name painted in large letters on the top- 
sails. Captain Dacres, her commander, had become 
conspicuous for his bravado in insulting American 
merchant captains. Since 1790 a question of im- 
pressment, or the press gang, had been debated 
between Washington and London, without much 
apparent benefit ; but now Commodore Rodgers 
received orders to put an end to these outrages, 
which made such annoying delay and greatly 
injured trade. Burning to revenge the C/iesapeake 
affair, the frigate President put to sea with her 
name boldly blazoned on her three topsails like 
those of the Guerriere. 

When near Sandy Hook an episode took place 
which precipitated the War of 181 2. At half-past 
eight in the evening of May 17th, Commodore 
Rodgers signalled a strange sail, asking, " What 
ship is that.''" The hailed vessel replied with four 
cannon shot. Then began a general fusillade, which 
lasted fifteen minutes. The British sloop of war, 
Little Belt, had foolishly attacked an American 
heavy frigate. The next morning it was found that 
the smaller vessel, though terribly shattered, was 
able to proceed on her course. The accounts of 
the affair given by the two commanders cannot be 



no rilE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

reconciled, l)iil the I)rc;icli was witlcnctl. Although 
it was, and always will be, a disgrace to their 
Christianity for linglish-speaking people to shed 
each other's blood, war broke out. 

When hostilities began the British had over a 
thousand armed ships. Flushed with their victories 
under Lord Nelson, and excited by the sea songs of 
Dibdin, they considered themselves " lords of the 
main." In their naval battles they had sunk hun- 
dreds of French ships, many of them as large and 
heavy as their own, and they had won flags French, 
Dutch, Spanish, Danish, by the hundreds. No one 
can ever accuse the l>ritish sailors or soldiers of 
a lack of courage. Now, how^ever, they were to 
learn from their own kinsmen that brute force is 
less valuable in war than intelligence, and that a 
little navy, contemptible in size, could strike down 
more British flags in a generation than they had 
lost in a century. 

On the American side were a few first-class ships 
and excellent guns manned and served mainly by 
native Americans. Althouoh Conorcss had ncLr- 
lected the navy, yet Commodore Rodgers's squad- 
ron was in the finest condition. As a rule, the 
British navy had no ships equal in general effec- 
tiveness to the American heavy frigates, the long 
guns of which had sights fitted to them, which 
enabled our men to lire with wonderful accuracy. 



IVI/Y A SECOND IVAk' FOR FREEDOM WAS FOUGHT. Ill 

In using sheet-lead cartridges, they anticipated the 
copper shells of later American invention. Further- 
more, our men were drilled to be cool. and to wait 
until the exact moment of firing. The Americans 
took more care of their guns, fastened them more 
securely, did not overload them, counted rather 
than weighed their shot, and depended on intelli- 
gence rather than on numbers. Besides the long 
guns were the short and chubby carronades, 
named from the Carron iron works in Scotland, 
where they were first made. These did terrible 
execution at close range in tearing up sails, rigging, 
and thus disabling the enemy. 

The naval officer of the early part of our century 
was usually a handsome man, with a sufficient num- 
ber of gilt buttons and expanse of gold braid on 
his coat to make him greatly admired of the ladies. 
The old pigtail and eelskin of the Revolutionary 
days had passed away at the dictate of fashion. 
Most of the officers had more or less wavy hair. 
How so many of them were able to make their hair 
curl is a mystery, but there is no secret as to why 
none of them wore mustaches or beards, for these 
things were not in fashion. Even individuals, how- 
ever eminent on deck or in port, could not gratify 
their taste, had they desired to keep the upper lip 
covered ; for the regulations of the navy forbade 
the growth of hair on the face or chin, and would 



112 THE ROMANCE OE CONQUEST. 

not tolerate a mustache " under any circumstances." 
So in their portraits we see the cpauletted naval 
heroes with high stocks and stand-up collars, with 
ruffled shirt bosoms, but only " sides " or short col- 
umns of whiskers below their ears, or occasionally 
coming forward toward the mouth or high up on 
the cheek. 

One great difference in the general spirit of the 
navy and that of the army in 1812, as in 1898, 
lay in this, that the navy was a purely professional 
school, in which only trained men thoroughly 
equipped for their work took part. Patriotism had 
thus the best chance to show itself. On the con- 
trary, the army, except the small nucleus of the 
regulars, became the prey of partisan politicians 
and of men io^norant of the scientific work of the 
true soldier. The navy had a further advantage in 
that the Tripolitan war had been a magnificent 
traininsf-school for our officers. Commodore Preble 
was really the father of the American navy, for he 
infused in it his dauntless spirit, and made the 
young officers proud of their calling. Under his 
own eyes were trained Hull, Decatur, Bainbridge, 
McDonough, Porter, Lawrence, Biddle, Chauncey, 
Warrington, Charles Morris, and Stewart, all of 
whom, in 181 2, kept our flag afioat on the seas, 
and won fame in the war with the mightiest naval 
power on this planet. 



CHAPTER XII. 

THE NAVAL CAMPAIGN OF l8l2. 

WHEN the declaration of war was made by 
Congress on the 12th of June, 181 2, there 
was no money in the treasury and the Cabinet was 
divided, On our side some of the veterans of the 
Revolution were living. So also was King George 
III. So great was the cowardly fear of British 
invincibility on the seas, that some in Washington 
urged that our men-of-war should keep within tide- 
water, and act only as harbor batteries. We had 
then only three first-class and two second-class 
frigates which were seaworthy, together with five 
brigs and sloops and three second-class frigates 
under repair, besides the one hundred and seventy 
little gunboats. Captains Bainbridge and Stewart 
went in person to remonstrate against the frigates 
being kept at home. Commodore Rodgers, as soon 
as news of the declaration of war came, moved out 
to sea, so as not to receive orders of recall. He 
was in charge of the President, United States, 
Congress, Argus, and Horiiet — one-third of our 
whole naval force at that time. 
I 113 



114 ^^'^''- 'ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

The naval campaign of 1812-1815 was one of the 
most wonderful in the annals of ocean war. Within 
two years the British lost more flags, through cap- 
ture by Americans, than had been won from them 
by their foes during the previous two centuries. 
The first gun afloat was fired by Commodore John 
Rodgers, who, in the President, the best sailing ship 
of the navy, chased the Belvidere, which, however, 
escaped to Halifax. Then, crossing the ocean, 
Rodgers wrought great havoc on the British com- 
merce off the Norway coast and in the seas around 
Great Britain. It was found necessary in London 
to despatch a great fleet of ships to find Rodgers, 
who, however, came back safely. Soon the Admir- 
alty in London issued an order to their war vessels 
to refuse battle with the Americans, except upon 
rigidly equal terms. They called our heavy frigates 
" disguised seventy-fours." 

The first combat at sea struck the keynote of 
victory. Captain Isaac Hull, in the Constitution, 
was chased by three British frigates, but surprised 
his veteran opponents by his bold and original 
methods of seamanship, and got off safely. Later, 
in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, he met alone and by 
herself the British man-of-war Guerriere, one of his 
late pursuers. This vessel had been captured from 
the French, and its name was only another form of 
the word "warrior." Then began the first of fif- 



'rilf', NAVAL CAMPAIGN OF 1812. I15 

teen naval battles, twelve of whieh were won by 
Americans. 

The GiicrrTcrc moved L(ayly to the work of battle 
and began firing rapidly, but Captain Hull kept his 
ofificers and men waiting until the right moment. 
They found it very hard to stand still, all expectant 
and excited as they were, and be fired at without 
making reply ; but, when once the 24-pounders 
began their music, so welcome to the ears of our 
tars, only twenty minutes were necessary to reduce 
the British ship to firewood. Every one of the masts 
of the Guerrieve was shot away, and her hull was so 
badly smashed by the American 24-pounders that 
she drifted helplessly as a hulk and had to be set on 
fire. When Captain Hull came into Boston with 
his prisoners, the ship, almost uninjured, was dubbed 
Old Ironsides. 

In October, 181 2, Captain Jacob Jones in the 
sloop Wasp met his Britannic Majesty's brig Frolic 
and gave battle, which began in a rough sea. Both 
ships had about the same force of men and guns, 
but British sailors seemed to blaze away without 
taking much aim, while the American artillerists 
always pointed their guns. The Frolic fired as she 
rose on the wave, the Wasp fired as she sunk, and 
every shot seemed to tell on the hull of her antago- 
nist. The consequences were that the comparative 
loss of the British and the Americans in this naval 



Il6 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

duel, as in that of tlie Constitution and Gncrriere, 
was five to one. Soon after the combat the British 
seventy-four-gun ship Poictiers appeared and took 
both the Wasp and the Frolic. 

This was in substance a civil war, for English- 
speaking men, with much the same ideas, were 
fighting each other and were equally brave ; but 
our ships were the best built in the world, and in 
nearly every case the Americans had the advantages 
in throwing: heavier shot and often havinsf more 
guns in a broadside. Yet even these facts do not 
account for the tremendous victories gained. The 
true reason was that the English had been spoiled 
by their victories over the French, and did not try 
to improve ; while the Americans were strict in 
discipline and were constantly aiming to do better. 
Our ships, guns, seamanship, and discipline were 
ahead of those of Europeans at that time. Our 
people were alert for new ideas, and for the best 
way of applying them, and the newspapers and 
patent office reports of that day show how active 
was the Yankee brain in generating new and 
wonderful engines of war. 

Late in October Commodore Decatur, command- 
ing the frigate United States, met the British ship 
Macedonian, which had been captured from the 
French. The British guns were i8- and 32-pound- 
ers. The Americans' were 24- and 42-pounders, and 



THE NA VAL CAMPAIGN OF 1812. I 1 7 

the United States had three more guns in broad- 
side, and therefore a much heavier battery. This 
does not, however, explain the completeness of the 
victory. The Americans displayed so much skill 
in the handling of their artillery that on board 
the United States the Americans killed and 
wounded numbered but thirteen, while on the 
British vessel there were eight times as many, or 
one hundred and four. The Macedonian became 
one of the most valuable and useful ships of our 
navy. 

The navy department now ordered a squadron, 
the Constitiition, Essex, and Hornet, to make a 
cruise in the Pacific Ocean to protect our com- 
merce and whaling fleet from the British cruisers. 
Then, for the first time, our national vessels were 
seen in that c^reatest of oceans, in which now we 
hold possessions, and where the stars and stripes 
have been planted to stay. When near Brazil, and 
four days after Christmas, the Constitution met the 
splendid British frigate, Java. Ships, guns, and 
men were very nearly matched, and the fight lasted 
over an hour. The Java was so badly smashed by 
the American shot that she could not be kept as a 
prize, and was sunk. The casualties on our side 
were thirty-tour and on the British one hundred and 
twenty-four. 

Two days after Washington's birthday. Captain 



Il8 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

Lawrence, in the brig Horiiet, near Demerara, in 
British Guiana, gave battle to the British vessel 
Peacock. In fifteen minutes after the first gun was 
fired the Peacock sunk so quickly that Lawrence's 
men could not save some of the British sailors, and 
three of the Americans went down with part of the 
crew of the Peacock. Beside the drowned men, 
thirty-eight of the British and five of the Hornet 
were killed or wounded in battle. The Hojniet was 
hardly scratched. No battle showed so clearly that 
not superior force and valor, for both crews were 
alike in numbers and bravery, but these joined with 
superior science, had won the day. 

This series of five naval actions, within as many 
months, shocked but enlightened the British public. 
The feeling of contempt for American ships, men, 
guns, and science changed to respect, and taught 
British naval men a lesson from which they have 
never ceased to profit. Instead of "a bunch of pine 
boards floating a bit of striped bunting," they saw 
in the American heavy frigate the best-equipped 
war-ship of modern times. 

It must never be forgotten that before 1812 there 
was no " nation" in the United States, in the same 
sense that there is now. The states were jealous 
and comparatively hostile to each other. Although 
the words " nation " and " national " were used, yet 
it was hard for a Frenchman or Englishman to see 



THE NAVAL CAMPAIGN OF 1812. I 19 

in the voluntary confederation of the thirteen states, 
or of the sixteen, a true nation. Consequently, most 
of our diplomacy, yes, even our begging for justice, 
was met with silent contempt. One set of our own 
politicians declared that the states were foreign to 
one another, and only a nation in their relation to 
other powers, or to Europe; but the Europeans 
could not see even this. It required the insults of 
France and Great Britain, and the humiliation of the 
Embargo and Non-intercourse laws, to fall like the 
blows of a hammer and weld together the states into 
"a more perfect union." These events served to 
create one new national spirit, which burst the 
shackles of sectionalism and of party spirit and ful- 
filled the desire of Washington, who wanted a truly 
American character. 



CHAPTER XIII. 

OUR KI.Al'. KKIT FLYING ON LARKS AND SKAS. 

1r was no wxMulcr tliat our army failed in this war, 
for ihc war deixirtnicnt was poorly organized, and 
few of the otfieers in the higher grades had seen any 
serviee since the RevoUition. It was proposed to 
invade Canada, but there were no roads worth 
speaking of, over whieh to march or take wagon- 
trains; the Indians were unfriendlv. On tlie other 
hand, tlie Canadians were skilled wateniien, who 
were likely to do better in the forests and along the 
lakes ai\d rivers than our men could hope to do. 

The British government sent .Admiral Sir John 
Warren to command the British sciuadron on the 
.American coast. llis next in conimand, Rear- 
Admiral Cockburn, kept the coast of Chesapeake 
Hav in alarm bv raitling the barnvards and villages 
of the region, captuiing and destrcning also I Lwre 
de (irace in Mar\l,\nel and 1 lanipton in \'irginia. 

One of the ablest men in the British navy was 
Captain Broke. He was in cH>mmand of the frigate 
S/i(nnio)i, which was n.mied after a ri\er in Ireland. 
This was one ot the lew \essels ot the British navv 



OUR FLAG k'KPT FLY IXC ON I.AKFS AND SEAS. 121 

on vvliicli the constant drill of marines and sailors, 
with cannon and small arms, with the firing of ball 
cartridges in practice, was steadily ke[)t up. On 
the first of June, he sent a challenge to Captain 
James Lawrence, who, after the sinking of the Pea- 
cock, had been put in command of the frigate Chesa- 
peake. Before it arrived Lawrence sailed out of 
Boston harbor to give battle to this, the finest 
vessel in the British navy. In the eyes of sailors, 
the CJiesapeake was considered unlucky, because in 
launching, her hull had stuck on the ways and she 
had reached the water with difficulty, and because 
also she had been " leopardized " or fired into, with- 
out ability to return the attack by the British man- 
of-war Leopard, and had struck her flag. The 
Chesapeake had only a raw crew, hastily gathered, 
many of them foreigners, and Lawrence had no 
time to drill them. The crew, equipment, and state 
of discipline on Lawrence's vessel were entirely 
diiTerent from those on any American ship in the 
navy. The sailors were a bad lot, disaffected, and 
clamorous for grog and promises of prize money. 
They had to be bribed to go to their duty. The 
forces of the two ships in power of iron and human 
muscle were about matched, but the Shannov, be- 
side bavins^ a brave and skilful commander, had an 
excellent crew in the highest state of efficiency, and 
it is ever the man more than the machine that tells. 



122 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

The British captains of this time preferred what 
they called " yard-arm engagements." By this they 
meant that after the first broadside their ships 
should be quickly ranged up alongside of the enemy 
so that the yard-arms of both could interlock or lie 
parallel. Then the grappling-irons could be thrown 
out, boarders could stream over the enemy's side 
and his ship be taken by assault, final victory being 
won by hand-to-hand fighting. This allowed sail- 
ors to do at sea very much what the British soldiers 
did on land — they fired a volley and then charged 
with a cheer, to finish with the bayonet. 

Hitherto, however, in the naval duels between 
American and British ships, the superior seaman- 
ship of our captains had prevented such a move- 
ment, and the cool scientific gunnery of our men 
had effectually spoiled the old programme. Now, 
unfortunately, at the first fire, the Chesapeake lost 
several of her officers, including her commander, 
Lawrence. He was mortally wounded and carried 
below, crying, " Don't give up the ship." Then the 
Shannon got into position where she could rake the 
doomed vessel. This is always the most murderous 
part of a sea battle, for instead of the ball, canister, 
and grape-shot tearing across the ship sideways, 
the missiles fiy from stern to stem along the decks, 
where hundreds of men are crowded together. In 
this way every shot is apt to do fivefold execution 



OUR FLAG KEPT FLYING ON LAKES AND SEAS. 1 23 

Very soon after the Chesapeake had been raked, 
losing most of her officers, a boarding party, led by 
the brave Captain Broke himself, reached the deck 
of the Chesapeake. The cowardly crew without 
discipline or officers retreated, but the brave chap- 
lain took up the sword and stood his ground, tak- 
ing off Broke's arm. After a fifteen minutes' fight, 
the Chesapeake was carried as a prize to Halifax. 
About half a ton of iron, mostly in the form of 
" langrage " shot from the American carronades, 
was taken out of the sides of the Shannon. This 
" flying cutlery," made by sewing up old bits of 
iron and metal scraps of all sorts in bags of leather, 
was very effective at short range in cutting the 
enemy's sails and rigging to pieces. 

The Chesapeake, after being actively used in the 
British navy for many years, was finally sold and 
broken up. Her timbers, some of them still marked 
with the shot of the Shannon, were used to build a 
flour mill. This still stands in use at an English 
village within a few miles of Portsmouth. Cap- 
tain Broke was made a nobleman. Provost Wallis, 
then a young officer on the Shaniion, lived to be an 
admiral and died within this decade. Lawrence's 
last cry, " Don't give up the ship," became a house- 
hold word in the United States, and was soon the 
augury of triumph on Lake Erie. 

Commodore Isaac Chaunccy, on the 9th of Novem- 



1^4 THE ROMAXCE OF COXQCEST. 

bcr, iSi 3, obtained control of Lake Ontario. Be- 
side handling his little schooners with ability, he 
had fresh ships built, and then supported General 
Pike in an attack upon the Canadian town of York, 
which was captured, and a ship also. Unfortu- 
nately some of our men burned the little parliament 
house, which afterward gave Admiral Cockburn an 
excuse for his disgraceful incendiarisni at W'ashinsf- 
ton. Fort George, at the mouth of the Niagara 
River, was also captured by the American tiotilla 
and forces. Two voung men who afterward became 
famous. Captain Oliver Hazard Perry and Lieuten- 
ant-Colonel W'intield Scott, took part in this gallant 
affair. Vet on the whole the campaign on the north- 
ern frontier was marked more by failures than by 
successes. Indeed, the American prospects in the 
earlv part or the tirst half of 1813 were very gloomy, 
when suddenly a great bright light of victory burst 
upon the nation. 

Oliver Hazard Perry had been sent to Lake Erie 
to take the na\al comniand. This C^hio region was 
so very far away in those days from New York and 
Philadelphia, that a grape-shot cost nearly its weight 
in silver, and powder was worth as much as spices, 
but then wood for fuel and shipbuilding was cheap 
autl plentiful. Setting out in a sleigh with his 
younger brother, he rode through the Mohawk 
X'allev and the woods of western New York. He 



OUR FLAG KEPT F/.Vf.VC 0^ LAKF.S AiXD SEAS. 1 25 

reached the town of luie, to wliieli gangs of sliip 
carpenters, who had travelled from Philadelphia by 
wagon, boat, and canoe, had also come. The shores 
of the lake furnished all the re(|uisite floating 
material in the forests which then stood miles deep. 
The axemen, carpenters, and blacksmiths began 
their work, and keels were laid and forges set 
up. Often what was standing timber in the morn- 
ing would be part of a ship before sunset. So 
green was the wood of this hastily improvised 
squadron, that the hammer which struck too far 
upon the nail head would s(|ueeze out the sa]) until 
the hammers face was wet and the carpenter must 
look out lest the sap fly in his eyes. When the 
Kentucky men, who had never seen boats bigger 
than batteaux, came on board these ships, they were 
surprised beyond measure at the largeness of the 
" big canoes." 

At the mouth of the bay, beside which the ships 
were built and launched, there was a bar of sand 
making shallow water. This was hard to get over 
any time, and under the fire of the enemy would be 
impossible. But long ago a Dutchman had in- 
vented what is called the " ship's camel," which is 
a long box or series of caissons of wood joined to- 
gether. These, when filled with water, sink under 
a ship, just as a camel kneels to receive its burden. 
When the water is pumped out of the boxes, they 



126 THE KOMAXCE OF COXQUEST. 

lift the ship up and carry it like a camel under his 
packs. With these, Perry got over the bar. His 
squadron consisted of nine vessels, two of which 
were the brigs Laivrcucc and Niagara. On the 
14th of September he advanced to meet Commo- 
dore Barclay, who was one of Nelsons veterans. 
The battle took place near Put-in Bay, Ohio. 
Perry, hoisting over his flag-ship Lazvrejicc, on a 
big square flag, the dying words of the commander 
after whom the ship was named, " Don't give up 
the ship," dashed at the enemy. The wind was 
light. The Lawrence was left without much sup- 
port from his other vessels, and was so exposed to 
the protracted British fire that her guns were all 
disabled and nearly all her men killed or wounded. 
It looked like a complete defeat for the Americans. 
At this darkest hour Perry, with those of his crew 
who were less severely wounded, lowered his boat 
and with his little brother passed through the 
terrific fire of cannon and musketry to the Niag- 
ara. Although splashed with water from balls 
which pierced clothing, splintered oars, and struck 
all around, the gallant commodore and his men 
reached the ship and sent Captain Elliott to bring 
up the schooners in the rear. 

It was in attempting to perform a similar feat of 
rowing between the Dutch and British fleets that 
an English admiral was killed. Our Commodore 



OUR FLAG KEPT FLYING ON LAKES AND SEAS. 1 27 

Tatlnall, in Chinese waters nearly a half century 
afterward, though in as great danger as Perry, 
was similarly successful. 

Re-forming his ships in line abreast, and the wind 
increasing. Perry broke the enemy's line and cap- 
tured the entire British squadron — the first time 
such a thing had happened in the history of the 
navy of Great Britain. Then Perry sat down and 
dictated that famous sentence of nine words. " We 
have met the enemy and they are ours." In his 
nervousness, as seen in the original letter, he left 
out one word. Brevity is not only the soul of wit, 
but of fame also, and the glory of a victor is 
usually enhanced by short sentences that stick in 
memory. 

In nature the soap bubble becomes more gor- 
geous in color and richer in prismatic tints as it 
becomes thinner. So the "bubble reputation," 
which ambitious patriots seek "even at the can- 
nons mouth," takes on richer rainbow hues when, 
with the breath of rhetoric, it catches the popular 
attention. Half of Oliver Perry's fame is due to 
his sententious despatch of nine words : " We have 
met the enemy and they are ours." Thomas Jeffer- 
son won renown by his pen in the same way. So 
also did Sheridan and Grant in our day. 

The British captured ships were used to trans- 
port General Harrison's troops to Maiden, while the 



128 THE ROMANCE OF COXQUEST. 

Kentucky cavalry marched round the shore of the 
lake. When the British forces retreated, they were 
pursued by our horsemen. In the battle on the 
5th of October, near the Moravian towns, the united 
forces of British Canadians and Indians were de- 
feated by Harrison, and Tecumseh was killed. This 
series of victories gave us peace and quiet on Lake 
Erie and throughout the Northwest. 

In the South four columns of invasion entered 
Alabama to destroy the Creek Indians, who had 
listened to the persuasions of Tecumseh, massacred 
hundreds of whites, and then fortified the Horse- 
shoe Bend of the Tallapoosa River, where they 
believed themselves safe. On the 27th of March 
General Andrew Jackson led the regulars and mili- 
tia to the attack. The volunteers and friendlv Ind- 
ians made the assault in the rear, while the regular 
army stormed the works in front. For five hours a 
terrible battle raged, and both parties fought like 
savages. Even after the firing was over, no prison- 
ers were taken, and the Indians were put to death 
as if they were vermin. In truth, the Americans 
were guilty of many frightful excesses and unneces- 
sary cruelties during this war. 



CHAPTER XIV. 

" OLD IRONSIDES " AND COTTON BALES. 

ONE of tlie most wonderful achievements on 
the ocean was that of Captain David Porter 
in the frigate Essex. At this time our American 
whalers were numerous in the Pacific, but were 
mostly unarmed, while the Britisli whaling-ships car- 
ried cannon and were privateers, we thus being at 
a disadvantage. The situation was relieved by the 
appearance of the Essex. Porter captured thirteen 
excellent vessels, sending some to the United States, 
and fitting out others as cruisers. 

For a time Porter and his men occupied the 
Marquesas Islands, which Mendana the Spaniard 
had lon^x aoo discovered and named. This was 
either after the wife of the viceroy of Peru, or be- 
cause the natives seemed to be so polite and well 
dressed that they were called marquises. The 
northwestern islands near by, and until late in this 
century considered a separate group, were discovered 
in 1 79 1 by an American merchant navigator, named 
Ingraham, and named the Washington Islands. Tat- 
tooing and cannibalism were both very fashionable 

K 129 



I30 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

among the natives. Only for a few months did the 
stars and stripes wave over the Httle archipelago. 
Then the Essex returned to Valparaiso. Near this 
port two British vessels, the frigate Phcebe and the 
sloop Cherub, attacked the Essex, and after a long 
battle captured and destroyed this fine man-of-war, 
named after the county in Massachusetts in which 
she was built. 

On the other hand, Captain Warrington, in the 
sloop Peacock, captured the British brig Epervier, 
off the coast of Florida, in April. Our new sloop 
of war Wasp, named after the captor of the Frolic, 
took and burned the sloop Reindeer, sunk the sloop 
Avon, and destroyed several prizes in the British 
channel. After this destructive cruise, nothing more 
was ever heard of the Wasp. 

By this time the royal government sent a large 
fleet to the Atlantic coast, which blockaded all our 
ports, and prevented our national vessels from get- 
ting to sea; but American privateers had been 
commissioned, and went cruising over the ocean 
to capture British ships. These vessels of various 
size w^ere swift and well manned, and on many the 
crews were splendidly drilled. They carried from 
two to ten guns, usually of long range. On most 
of them the men were armed with pistol and cut- 
lass. They wore leather hats, strengthened with 
strips of steel on the top for defence against sword 



"OLD IRONSIDES'' AA'D COTTON BALES. 131 

strokes, which were held on by straps of bearskin. 
These came down over the mouth and chin, giving 
the wearer a ferocious appearance. Altogether, dur- 
ing the war, our privateers captured about fourteen 
hundred, and our men-of-war about three hundred 
British vessels. These were wonderful results, show- 
ing also the wastefulness and foolishness of war. 

Thus far the British government, having Napo- 
leon to attend to and battles to fiolit aoainst the 
French, had carried on a defensive policy during 
war with the United States; but when Napoleon 
abdicated, bodies of veteran troops were sent over 
to America who were expected to do great things 
in marching from Canada to invade American soil. 
This British army of twelve thousand men took the 
same route as that of Burgoyne in 1777, and was 
supported on Lake Champlain by a squadron con- 
sisting of the Coiijiaiicc, Linnet, CJnibb, and Finch. 
Our Commodore JMcDonough had, beside his flag- 
ship Saratoga^ the brig Eagle, the schooner Ticon- 
deroga, and the sloop Preble, while both parties had 
a flotilla of gunboats. In Plattsburg Bay McDon- 
ough waited until the enemy appeared with a fleet 
of sixteen vessels, mounting ninety-six guns, and car- 
rying one thousand men. Our force consisted of 
fourteen vessels, carrying eighty-six guns, served by 
eight hundred and fifty men. Then, on the iith 
of September, began a great battle in perfectly 



132 THE ROMAXCE OF CO.VQUEST. 

smooth water, the guns being fired at point-blank 
ranofe. Commodore McDonouoh showed consum- 
mate powers of seamanship. After his starboard 
battery had been silenced, he was able to veer his 
ship round, having foreseen and provided for this 
ver)'- event. So, getting in position, and sending 
out from his port battery rapid and accurate broad- 
sides, INIcDonough, ably seconded by Captain Cassin, 
won a splendid victory, destroying the fleet and com- 
pelling the British army to retreat to Canada. 

This battle of Lake Champlain was really fought 
with more science and skill, and was far more im- 
portant in results, than was that of Lake Erie, 
while McDonough, a veteran of the Tripolitan war, 
was a more accomplished naval officer than was 
Oliver Perry. Yet where thousands know of the 
hero of the short and easily quoted despatch and of 
many pictures, statues, and eulogies, only tens are 
familiar with the name and work of McDonough, 
or know that among those most competent to 
judge — the officers of the navy — ''the battle of 
Plattsburg Bay is justly ranked among the very 
highest of its claims to glory." Both Perry and 
McDonough sprang from that nobly endowed 
Scotch-Irish stock that has so enriched our coun- 
try and shed lustre upon her fair name. 

The navv of the United States was in a much 
better condition at the end of the war than at the 



f 



"OLD I/WXSIDES'' .LVD COTTON BALES. 133 

beginning; but as there were no telegraphs in those 
clays to send news quickly, several naval duels, 
beside the great land battle at New Orleans, were 
fought after the treaty of peace had been concluded. 
When Commodore Decatur, on a dark night, tried 
to get to sea from New York harbor, his ship, the 
President, struck on the bar. She was badly injured 
while beating on the sand, so that her power of 
swift sailing was greatly diminished. Chased by 
the British squadron and fired upon, a battle began 
with the EndyiJiiou, which Decatur dismantled, 
silenced, and compelled to drop out of the action ; 
but the President was surrounded and was obliged 
to surrender, after having lost twenty-four killed 
and fifty-five wounded. The British, after refitting 
this finest sailer known, kept the splendid ship for 
many years. In a certain instance, during the Mexi- 
can war, she actually beat some of our men-of-war 
by her speed. 

One of the most brilliant actions in our history 
was when Commodore Charles Stewart, in the one 
vessel Constitntion, captured two ships in one fight, 
the Cyane and the Levant. It required the finest 
seamanship on Stewart's part to manoeuvre and 
fight one ship with Old Ironsides, and at the same 
time to prevent the other from getting in a position 
to rake him. This battle was fought on the night 
of February 20, 181 5, and lasted forty minutes. 



134 ^'^^^ ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

The Cyane had thirty-four guns and the Levant 
thirty-one guns, but the Cyane was recaptured by 
a British squadron. Stewart was born in Philadel- 
phia July 28, 1778, and went to sea at the age of 
thirteen, becoming captain of an Indiaman before 
he was twenty. He was also in the French naval 
war of 1800 and in the Tripolitan campaign. He 
lived until the year 1869. Well do I remember him. 

Captain James Biddle, another officer born in 
Philadelphia, served in the Tripolitan war, during 
which he was a prisoner nineteen months. On the 
23d of March, 18 15, in command of the Hornet, he 
fought one of the finest naval battles of the war, 
capturing the brig Penguin. To close the naval 
record. Captain Warrington, in the Peacock, captured 
the East India Company's armed sloop Naiitilns, 
in June ; but on hearing that peace had been de- 
clared, released this prize and came home, finding 
all our men-of-war safe in port. 

Woman's part in war in nerving heroes to duty, 
in providing comforts, and in healing and nursing, 
has been largely overlooked, but the modern his- 
torian attends more generously to the facts and 
truth in this matter. Yet the glory of the mother 
of heroes and her part in educating them was finely 
shown, albeit in a homely way, by two Rhode Island 
farmers, as they met on the day after the news from 
Lake Erie, in 1813. Said one to the other: — 



"OLD IRONSIDES'' AND COTTON BALES. 135 

" Well, I see that Mrs. Perry has licked the 
British." 

" What ? It was Oliver, her son, who did it ; you 
mean him } " 

"No, I don't; I mean his mother, Mrs. Perry." 

" Why .? " 

" Because she always trained every one of her 
five boys to keep out of a fight, unless he could not 
possibly help it; but if he got beaten, she always 
gave him another whipping when he got home. So 
Oliver had to win. She made him do it." 

On land some of the military operations of the 
War of 181 2 were a disgrace to the country. In the 
North, General Hull surrendered his forces at De- 
troit. In the South, General Jackson beat the Creek 
Indians at Horseshoe Bend on the Alabama River, 
and completely destroyed their power. Generals 
Scott, Brown, and Ripley crossed over into Canada, 
gaining the battle of Chippewa on July 5th, and los- 
ing that of Lundy's Lane, though this is often put 
down falsely as an American victory. On the Poto- 
mac there was something like a battle fought at Bla- 
densburg, in which the American militia ran away. 
Admiral Cockburn, who disgraced the British name, 
marched into Washington and set fire to the capi- 
tol, the executive mansion, and other public build- 
ings, in revenge for the Americans having burnt 
government edifices at York, the capital of Canada. 



136 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

Then moving on to Baltimore the British fleet 
and army tried to take Fort Mc Henry, but after a 
twenty-four hours' bombardment were unable to do 
so. Our country gained by this British defeat the 
stirring song of " The Star-Spangled Banner," 
Francis Scott Key, an American who was prisoner 
on board a man-of-war, wrote the stanzas as in the 
morning he saw that " our flag was still there." 

The one brilliant victory on land was the battle 
of New Orleans, which was fought fifteen days 
after a treaty of peace had already been signed, for 
there were no telegraphs in those days. Great 
Britain had been occupied in Europe during most 
of this our second war for independence, and could 
not send a large army to our country until after the 
battle of Leipsic. Then fifteen thousand British 
veterans under the command of General Pakenham, 
who had been Wellington's quartermaster, were de- 
spatched to the mouth of the Mississippi to take 
New Orleans, and thus control the navigation of 
the great river. 

General Andrew Jackson was put in command of 
the American army gathered to oppose the skilled 
warriors of Europe. Most of his forces consisted of 
raw, undisciplined militia from Kentucky and Ten- 
nessee ; but they were skilled marksmen and knew 
how to handle the rifle. To fortify the city Jackson 
used cotton bales, which had the great advantage 








THE BATTLE OF NEW ORLEANS. 



"OLD IRONSIDES" AND COTTON BALES. 1 37 

of being tough, and could be easily rolled forward 
or backward. Commodore Patterson, with his little 
naval force, greatly hampered the advance of the 
British fleet, and one fort at Chalmette v/as so hand- 
somely served that the invaders were kept back nine 
days. In fact, it was the artillery that really decided 
the victory, though the slaughter of British infantry 
at the hands of the riflemen behind the cotton was 
very great. After General Pakenham and other 
high officers had been killed, the British gave up the 
campaign and were soon repatriated, or called home. 
The victor's statue stands proudly to-day in the cen- 
tre of Jackson Square, in the city of New Orleans. 

On its foreign side the War of 1812 was really 
our second war for freedom. It gave the world 
assurance that in all our forei2:n relations we were 
not thirteen or eighteen states, but one country. 
On its domestic side it consolidated the Union. 
It fulfilled the preamble of the Constitution. Hence- 
forward, there was no more talk about a voluntary 
confederation, but of a nation. Our naval victories 
and the battle of New Orleans compelled recogni- 
tion of our country, not only abroad, but even at 
home, where the local and sectional had predomi- 
nated over the national spirit. 

In August, 18 14, three American and five British 
commissioners met at Ghent, to arrange a treaty of 
peace. Yet even while the negotiations were going 



138 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

on, the British veterans were being shipped to New 
Orleans, and the war party and war newspapers in 
Great Britain were crying out to have President 
Madison exiled to some island, even as Napoleon 
was to be sent to " a lone, barren isle." The London 
Times said of the United States, " Better is it that we 
should grapple with the young lion when he is first 
fresh with the taste of our flock, than wait until in 
the maturity of his strength he bears away at once 
both sheep and shepherd." 

After seven months wrangling and negotiation 
at Ghent, the treaty was signed December 24, 18 14. 
It was ratified by the Senate February 17, 1815. 
Yet it did not touch one of the points on which 
the United States had declared war. Our frigates 
had sufficiently settled these matters, and our rights 
on the ocean were respected. No foreign nation 
was likely ever to establish itself on our territory. 
Through the development of our own industries in 
mills and founderies, we were now able to weave our 
own cloth from our own cotton and wool, to make 
our own tools and machines, no longer depending 
upon Europe. 

Unique and wonderful was the record of the frig- 
ate Constitution in the two wars, Tripolitan and 
British. Within three years she had been twice 
chased by squadrons, fought three big battles, and 
captured five large men-of-war. She never lost a 



"OLD IRONSIDES" AND COTTON BALES. 1 39 

mast or went ashore, and but few of her crew or 
officers had been killed or wounded ; but then, she 
was always well manned and commanded. Men are 
more than ships or guns. 

Years afterward, when it was proposed to break 
up this historic leader of the naval triumphs of 1812, 
Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes wrote the poem " Aye, 
Tear her Tattered Ensign Down," and popular 
feeling demanded that she be repaired and kept 
afloat. This was done. Safely housed and roofed 
over, the Constitution has held a conspicuous place 
of honor on several great naval celebrations, one 
as late as the Peace Jubilee of 1898, and on the 
occasion of her own centennial. Visited by tens 
of thousands of people, her roominess, her great 
breadth, and the facilities for comfort of officers 
and men have surprised those familiar with the 
narrow vessels of to-day. 

It is a curious fact that both our first and " our 
second war for freedom ' were fought while King 
George III, the monarchical figure-head of Great 
Britain, was living. Born in 1738, he suffered long 
from insanity, and died in 1820. Our flags, then 
containing twenty-three stars, hung at half mast in 
sympathy with a narrow and weak-minded, a well- 
meaning but unfortunate man. 



CHAPTER XV. 

MADISON AND MONROE. 

IMMEDIATELY after the peace of Ghent, De- 
^ catur sailed with a powerful squadron of eleven 
ships, including some captured from the British, to 
settle with the Dey of Algiers, who had begun 
seizing our ships. Great was the surprise of the 
Barbary ruler, who supposed the naval power of 
the United States to have been entirely wiped off 
the seas by the British. Instead of this, a big 
Yankee squadron appeared, in which were several 
vessels taken in battle from the very power that 
had been expected to destroy the American navy. 
Decatur's ships were the Guerrzere, Macedoniaji, 
Epervier, Constellation, Ontario, Firefly, Shark, 
Flambeau, Torch, and Spitfire. Two Algerine 
corsairs were at once captured. 

The American eagle bears in his talons the 
arrows of war and peace. The Divan was given 
choice of either, for Decatur had on hand a new 
treaty, already declaring that tribute was abolished 
forever. The Dey wanted time to consider. He 
even pleaded for three hours. The reply to his 
envoy was : — 

140 



MADISON AND MONROE. 14I 

"Not a minute. If your squadron appears in 
sight before the treaty is actually signed by the 
Dey and sent off with the American prisoners, ours 
will capture it." 

Pretty soon an Algerine ship did come in sight, 
and our men cleared for action ; but, although the 
messenger with the treaty had to row five miles to 
the shore and back, the Dey signed inside three 
hours. Within forty-one days after the squadron 
had left American waters, the American Consul- 
General landed with honor, and all claims were 
paid and captives restored. Decatur chivalrously 
restored two Algerine vessels which we had cap- 
tured. 

One day the minister of the Dey remarked sorrow- 
fully to the British Consul as follows : " You told us 
that the Americans would be swept from the sea in 
six months by your navy, and now they make war 
upon us with some of your own vessels which they 
have taken." 

Thus had our naval officers, Preble, Bainbridge, 
Decatur, and their gallant subordinates, in the 
classic waters of the Mediterranean, by a series of 
brave actions, laid the foundations of our navy's 
noble reputation. They blew to atoms both the 
gunboat policy and the claims of robber rulers 
to molest our commerce and enslave our citizens, 
and they won the freedom of the seas and the 



142 'nil': ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

rij^hts of the siiilor in llu' \\^;ir of 181 2. 'I'lic Pope 
of Rome p;ii(l a liiL;Ii tribute of jjraise to our little 
country, declaring- tliat the United States liad done 
more to humble the pride of tlie Moliammedan 
pirates than all luu'ope. 

Our navy, originally created in the interests of 
civilization, has been througliout all its history an 
instrument to tlie liumbling of the tyrants' pride 
and tlie advance of freedom throughout the world. 
The stars and stripes have become " the symbol 
of light and law " and the hope of the nations. 
Columbia is " the gem of the ocean," 

" Thy mandates make heroes assemble 
When liberty's form comes in view ; 
Thy banners make tyranny tremble 

Wiien borne l)y the red, white, and blue." 

Later on Commodore Hainbridge arrived in the 
Mediterranean, with the line-of-battle ship Inde- 
pcudcncc carrying seventy-four guns. This was the 
first war vessel of that type which floated our flag 
in this favorite cruisinc: Q:round of our officers. A 
number of these big ships were built in our ship- 
yards. 'I'hey carried from seventy to one hundred 
guns, and were named after states and statesmen. 
They were the Independence, Washinoton, Franklin^ 
Colnmbns, North Carolina, OJiio, and / \'r)nonl, while 
the Pennsylvania was })ierced for one hundred and 



MADISON AND MONROE. 143 

twenty guns. Nevertheless, very little value or satis- 
faction was ever derived from the wooden line-of- 
battle ships. Such a ship was an Old World idea, 
which would not work well with Americans. Most 
of their old hulks have become receiving ships at 
navy-yards. The frigates were always useful. 

Our excellent example was soon followed by the 
British and Dutch. Under Lord Exmouth and 
Admiral Van der Capellen, Algiers was bombarded 
and burned. The next day the Dey signed the 
treaty, by which he agreed to treat prisoners of war 
according to Christian customs. He then released 
1642 Christian slaves, or counting in those from 
Tunis and Tripoli 3000. Great was the joy in 
many homes throughout Christendom. Yet bar- 
barism is easier to coerce than to cure. 

When the next Dey came in power, he kidnapped 
the daughters of European residents for his harem, 
and sent plague ships about the Mediterranean to 
spread pestilence, thus making himself an inter- 
national nuisance. 

It is hard for a thief to thoroughly reform. The 
Dey of Algiers denounced the treaty of 181 5, dis- 
missed our Consul, and then wrote our President a 
letter, in language such as a polite cutthroat might 
pen, as follows : — 

" His Majesty the Emperor of America, its ad- 
jacent and dependent provinces, coast, and wherever 



144 ^^^^ ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

his government may extend ; our noble friend, the 
support of the kingdoms of the nation of Jesus, the 
pillar of all Christian sovereigns, the most glorious 
among the princes, elected amongst many lords and 
nobles ; the happy, the great, the amiable James Madi- 
son, emperor of America — may his reign be happy 
and glorious, and his life long and prosperous." 

But President Madison, replying the next year, 
in 1816, said quietly and without any flower gardens 
of rhetoric : — 

"The United States, whilst they wish for war 
with no nation, will buy peace of none. It is a 
principle incorporated into the settled policy of 
America, that as peace is better than war, war is 
better than tribute." 

When, therefore, the American squadron under 
Commodore Chauncey appeared in 181 7, the treaty 
was immediately renewed. Thus the United States 
was the first nation to abolish tribute, and to com- 
pel the Barbary powers to treat prisoners of war in 
a Christian manner. The greatest blessing we won, 
out of these difficulties, was a navy with noble tra- 
ditions and prestige. Though such a force was 
expensive, yet our diplomatic negotiations with the 
Barbary states had cost as much and even more, 
that is, between three or four million dollars. 

English and French ships, in 18 19, blockaded the 
Algerine ports and made the barbarian Dey behave 



MADISON AND MONROE. I45 

himself. The insult to the French Consul, in 1827, 
exhausted French patience. After a three years' 
blockade of the port an army was landed in Algiers, 
and the country put under military control and 
kept as a colony of France during forty years, or 
until 1 87 1, when the country was given a civil 
administration. 

Out of this French occupation emerged into his- 
tory the Zouaves, or native Algerian troops, serving 
at the papal court in the French army and under 
the French flag on both sides of the Mediterranean 
and in the Crimea. During our own Civil War 
this picturesque costume was for a while borrowed 
by some of our volunteer regiments, but soon aban- 
doned as a rather expensive novelty and less suita- 
ble than the blue blouse and trousers. Gradually 
the native Algerians were separated, and became 
known as the Turcos, while the Zouaves became 
almost entirely French. After the Commune had 
been suppressed, and the army entered Paris, the 
Zouave organization was dissolved. 

In 1876 it compelled great contrasts with those 
early days, when our navy won fame and set an 
example to the world in the classic waters of the 
Mediterranean, to have these once Barbary powers 
coming with us in peaceful rivalry and exhibiting 
their products at the Centennial Exposition at 
Philadelphia. 



146 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

The next President was James Monroe, after 
whom the " Monroe Doctrine " was named. This 
meant that the United States, while resolving not 
to meddle with the affairs of the nations of the Old 
World, were equally determined that these should 
not unjustly interfere in the affairs of the New 
World. Our people believed that the different 
nations in the two Americas had a right to man- 
age their own business, without interference from 
Europe. In his message of December 2, 1823, 
President Monroe said, " We should consider any 
attempt on their part to extend their system to any 
portion of this hemisphere as dangerous to our peace 
and safety," and interference with American politics 
anywhere, as " the manifestation of an unfriendly 
disposition toward the United States." 

Most of the countries of Central and South 
America had thrown off the yoke of Spain and de- 
clared themselves for self-government. The mon- 
archs of Europe looked with contempt and fear 
upon all republics or government " of the people, 
for the people, and by the people." It seemed as 
though Spain was trying to get the other one-man 
powers of Europe to compel the Spanish- American 
republics to revert to despotism, and wear again the 
yoke of obedience to the old country. The proposi- 
tion of a union of English-speaking peoples against 
Spanish encroachment came first as a suggestion 



MADISON AND MONROE. 1 47 

from the British statesman, George Canning, but 
Mr. Monroe adopted the idea with improvement 
and enlargement. 

We may here give one example of how even con- 
temptible little countries like Portugal looked down 
upon republics. When Lieutenant Matthew Cal- 
braith Perry called upon the Portuguese Governor 
at Teneriffe, in the Canary Islands, in 1815 or 1816, 
he offered to tender a salute to the Portuguese 
Governor, provided the compliment was returned 
gun for gun. The Governor replied that it would 
give him great pleasure to reply to the salute, but 
with one gun less, as it was the custom of Portugal 
to return an equal number of guns only to acknowl- 
edge sovereigns, but to republics one gun short. 
Perry plainly replied that as the United States 
acknowledged no nation as entitled to greater re- 
spect than itself, no salute would be fired, and so 
the American man-of-war went out in silence. 

Monroe had been a student who left his college 
in Virginia and books to be a soldier in the Revo- 
lutionary War. He was at the battle of Trenton. 
Now as President he took his oath of office, near 
the ruins of the burnt capitol in Washington. 
His colleague, Vice-President Tompkins, had 
been the great war Governor of New York in 
the campaigns of 181 2-1 8 15. Tompkins first 
proposed officially the abolition of slavery in the 



148 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

Empire State, and after him one of its central 
and most beautiful counties is named. 

Under Mr. Monroe " an era of good feeling " 
began. The President travelled through New 
England, where many of the old Revolutionary 
veterans were delighted to see him wearing the 
old buff and blue. All sections of the country 
were reunited in fresh loyalty to the government. 
The nation gratefully remembered its heroes and 
made generous provisions for the old soldiers, 
pensioning the veterans of the war and their 
widows to the extent of $65,000,000. 



CHAPTER XVI. 

THE SEMINOLE AND BLACK HAWK WARS. 

THE next war that broke out, when our regular 
army consisted of about ten thousand men, be- 
came a fresh occasion for the increase of United 
States territory. Florida was still a Spanish pos- 
session, and in the swamps called the Everglades 
roamed a tribe of Indians called Seminoles. Gov- 
ernment by the Spaniards did not amount to very 
much beyond the two towns of St. Marks and 
Pensacola, so that between runaway slaves, bad 
Indians, white desperadoes and pirates, the whole 
territory was a menace to the people of the South. 
The President ordered General Andrew Jackson, 
with the regulars and volunteers from Georgia 
and Tennessee and some friendly Creek Indians, 
to enter the region and secure quiet. 

Jackson's campaign was vigorously conducted. 
Two Englishmen charged with inciting the Ind- 
ians to incursions and massacre were tried by 
court martial, sentenced to death, and hanged. 
This act of Jackson excited great indignation in 
Great Britain and Spain. It also raised perplex- 

149 



150 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

ing questions of diplomacy, which, however, were 
settled in 1819, when Spain ceded Florida to 
the United States for the sum of ^5,000,000. 
Our southern frontier was thus rectified and 
sixty thousand square miles were added to the 
United States. On July 10, 182 1, the red and 
yellow flag of Spain was hauled down, and that 
of the United States, with thirteen stripes and 
twenty-four stars, was hoisted at all the military 
stations. During the next year Florida was organ- 
ized as a territory, but from 1835 to 1842 was 
the scene of almost constant Indian wars. 

The Seminoles had agreed to remove west of 
the Mississippi, but the ratification of the treaty 
was delayed in Congress, and meanwhile the red 
men of the swamps became dissatisfied and re- 
fused to go, while outrages were committed by 
both whites and Indians. The tribe was divided — 
one-half agreeing to go west, while the other half 
was violently excited by Osceola, a half-breed. 
This man of spirit and ability had felt himself in- 
jured, because his wife, a fugitive negro slave, had 
been taken away from him by her owner. When 
Osceola protested, using language which the army 
officers considered insulting, he was imprisoned 
for a time and was ever afterward bitter and re- 
vengeful. 

Matters began to look very warlike, yet few prep- 



THE SEMINOLE AND BLACK HAWK WARS. 151 

arations were made to Qruard ao;ainst danger. On 
the 28th of December, as Major Dade and a detach- 
ment of 1 10 men were moving through the swampy 
country, and the dark woods hung with long, low 
beards of Florida moss, unable to see their deadly 
foes, they were ambuscaded and surrounded by 
invisible marksmen. After a long and brave fight 
every white man was killed, except three or four 
who feigned death and escaped to tell the tale, 
which is still recalled by the stone pyramid com- 
memorating the sad event. After a good deal of 
military activity, in which the Seminoles showed 
surprising ability in war, they first agreed to move 
west late in 1837, and then refused once more. 
Osceola was captured by stratagem. In other 
words, he was decoyed within our lines. Then, 
by the base treachery of our army officers, he was 
knocked down, seized, and put in prison, where he 
died — another foul blot on our country's history. 
Although Generals Scott, Clinch, Heustis, Jessup, 
Taylor, and Worth took part in this Seminole war, 
it was not until 1842, after an enormous loss of life 
and money, that the Seminoles yielded and crossed 
the Mississippi. It is more than probable that Gen- 
eral Worth, by his truth, honor, wisdom, and kind- 
ness to the Indians, accomplished as much as all 
the bullets and shell of the soldiers. 

It costs vastly more to kill a red man than to edu- 



152 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

cate him. Sooner or later the nation has to pay in 
blood and tears and money for cruelty, treachery, 
and unrequited toil, whether of red, black, or yellow 
humanity. Occasionally it is good to review a war, 
after the blood and glory are over, and to sum up 
results. How was it in the matter of the whites 
and Seminoles } Osceola was the son of an Eng- 
lishman, named William Powell, and an Indian 
mother. When but twelve years of age he had 
come under the influence of Tecumseh. He cared 
nothing for money gained by robbery, and would 
allow no scalping or mutilation of the dead. He 
never forgot a kindness. His wife was the daughter 
of a fugitive slave, and was stolen from him because 
she was a slave, and when Osceola demanded her 
release, using rough language. Colonel Thompson 
ordered him put in irons. 

The awful results of this lack of tact in dealing 
with a proud-spirited Indian were seen. Within six 
months Thompson was murdered, a battle took 
place, Dade's men were massacred, the forts at- 
tacked, and in the spirited actions which followed 
the Indians more than held their own against great 
odds. Finally it was only through the white man's 
treachery that Osceola was seized. It was like 
caging an eagle to put this chief in prison, and his 
proud spirit wore out his body. His death at Fort 
Moultrie, January 20, 1838, was worthy of a noble 



THE SEMINOLE AND BLACK ILIWK WARS. 153 

son of the forest. Callinir for his best war dress, he 
put it on. Then, unable to speak, but bidding by 
grasp of the hand his warriors and captors farewell, 
he drew out his war knife from its sheath, held it in 
his right hand, and crossing the blade over his left 
on his breast breathed his last. 

Thus ended one of the most disgraceful chapters 
in the history of a long " century of dishonor " in 
which Americans have been both cruel and treach- 
erous to the sons of the soil. The whole story of 
the Florida war illustrates again the wastefulness 
and the wickedness of much of our dealing with the 
Indians. 

What is called Black Hawk's War, in which 
Abraham Lincoln took part as a captain of volun- 
teers, broke out in 1832. As chief of the Sac 
Indians, Black Hawk had resisted the settling of 
Illinois by the white immigrants from the East, and 
in the War of 181 2 had taken the part of the British. 
Later, he and the Sacs and Foxes had been removed 
from their old hunting-ground on the east side of 
the Mississippi River and compelled to go westward. 
At sixty-five years of age, still restless, dissatisfied, 
and ambitious, he recrossed the Mississippi River, 
hoping to recover the lands formerly held ]3y his 
tribesmen. All such hopes, whether of Pontiac, 
Tecumseh, or Black Hawk, are in vain. He and 
his warriors were defeated, first by Colonel Dodge, 



154 "^HE. ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

and then, finally and completely, at Bad Axe, Michi- 
gan, in August, 1832, by General Henry Atkinson. 
Again the tribe was removed westward. Black 
Hawk, his sons, and a few warriors were kept for 
a while as hostages. They were brought to the 
eastern cities that they might see the power of the 
white men and learn how foolish resistance was. 

I have heard from my father, who knew Black 
Hawk, of the personal dignity of this chief. Never- 
theless the inland Indians do not like the salt sea 
or the sea air. On one occasion the sachem and 
his braves were in charge of my father, while going 
from one city to another on the Atlantic coast. 
They squatted in their blankets, smoking their 
calumets, in a cosey, sheltered corner below deck, 
when some sailor happened to open a hatchway 
that let in a blast of cold air and spray. Instantly 
the whole party rose up and fled to the cabin, 
grunting out, " Ugh ! ugh ! " 

Under President Monroe the great national road 
was built from Wheeling through to the Missis- 
sippi, and soon the trafific was immense, as the 
great march toward the setting sun continued. 

In 1 824-1 825 La Fayette visited the United 
States, and everywhere received a warm and gratify- 
ing welcome. To this day, the large number of cities 
which have in them a La Fayette Street or Avenue, 
and of towns and counties named after him, show 



THE SEMINOLE AND BLACK HAWK WARS. 1 55 

how deep was the impression he made upon our 
grandfathers. In Philadelphia, when a salute was 
fired in his honor from old cannon used in the 
Revolution, he recognized one, that had its muzzle 
worn on the under side, as the piece which he 
himself had saved during his skilful retreat from 
Barren Hill to Valley Forge, even after a British 
cannon shot had dismounted it. Lashino: the orun 
to a wagon belonging to John Harby, my own 
great-grandfather, though its muzzle dragged over 
the rough and stony road, La Fayette saved the 
piece. He drew off his men, also, whom the Brit- 
ish and Hessians had hoped to surprise and make 
prisoners. I used to hear, from my grand-aunts 
and grandmother, who, as children near Valley 
Forge, had been robbed by the Hessians, the story 
of La Fayette's impressment of their father s wagon ; 
and how, in 1825, they saw the once young gen- 
eral, now an old man, ride down Chestnut Street 
in Philadelphia. 

The building of other highways to the west 
continued, but the greatest public improvement, 
made up to that date in the United States, was 
in 1825, by which the fresh water of the Great 
Lakes was poured into the brine of the Atlantic. 
The Erie Canal was dug to connect the Hudson 
River at Troy with Lake Erie, a distance of 363 
miles, the difference in level being over six hun- 



156 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

dred feet in favor of Buffalo. As the Dutch had 
long before conquered up-hill difficulties by the 
water ladder called a lock, so the state founded 
by Dutchmen could dig the greatest canal then 
known. During eight years a great army of labor- 
ers cut down the forests, dug the ditch, blasted 
the rocks, built bridges across rivers, and set the 
masses of masonry so that the water and boats 
could be carried upward and over all obstacles. 

In 1825, when the work was done, Clinton car- 
ried a kegful of the water of Lake Erie and 
poured it into the Hudson River, in front of New 
York City, where it is but an arm of the ocean. 
When the water was let into the artificial river, 
a line of cannon, five miles apart, boomed the news 
from one end of the state to the other. The canal 
was soon paid for by its own revenue. Freight, 
which used to take three weeks of hauling by 
wagon and team over roads between Albany and 
Buffalo, went through in seven days and at one- 
thirtieth the cost. The whole region west and 
southwest of New York now attracted an enor- 
mous number of settlers from the further east. 
To-day there is nowhere in the world a finer con- 
tinuous line of cities than between Boston and 
Buffalo. Besides the traffic of stage-coaches on 
land, packet boats bore on the bosom of the canal 
many thousand passengers to and fro. 



THE SEMINOLE AND BLACK HAWK WARS. 1 57 

Travel soon began to be even more rapid, easy, 
and inviting, through the invention of the loco- 
motive. Charles Carroll, of Carrollton, who had 
signed his name to the Declaration of Indepen- 
dence, and who, at ninety years of age, was the 
lone survivor of fifty-six eminent men, dug the 
first spadeful of earth for what is now the Balti- 
more and Ohio railway system. Peter Cooper 
built the first American locomotive at Baltimore, 
runnino: it on the road built from Baltimore to 
Ellicott's Mills. The iron horse excelled so hand- 
somely the one of flesh and blood, both in speed 
and endurance, that the days of the stage-coach 
were numbered. The first passenger railway be- 
tween the Mohawk and the Hudson, or Schenec- 
tady and Albany, which began work in 1831, was 
drawn by the engine John Bull, which was ex- 
hibited as a curiosity at the Chicago World's Fair 
in 1893. John Bulls tender carried several barrels 
of wood as fuel, and the cars were old stage-coaches 
set on flanged iron wheels, which ran on strap- 
iron tracks. As a rule, the railway systems of the 
United States, especially those first made, ran for 
the most part from east to west, or in the way 
that emigration was moving, but at right angles 
or crosswise to the courses of rivers. 

Slavery from the very first had been a dangerous 
element in our free country, but when the cotton 



158 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

gin was invented, servile labor was made so valu- 
able that negro bondage became more and more 
a dividing and weakening force in the country. 
It caused the northern and the southern people 
first to dislike and then to hate each other. For, 
while one justified slavery, even going so far as 
to twist and contort the Bible to support the in- 
iquity, the other not only branded it as " the sum 
of all villanies," but even denounced the Consti- 
tution of the United States for approving of the 
" institution." Furthermore, the southern people, 
by raising tobacco, rice, indigo, and cotton, devot- 
ing their energies to agricultural production, cared ' 
little or nothing for manufacturing enterprises. 
They wanted to buy their goods and tools in 
Europe at low rates. The northern people, being 
manufacturers, had different interests, and wished 
to prevent European goods from coming in, ex- 
cept under heavy tariff duties. They demanded 
protection, in order to encourage home manufac- 
tures so that they might get rich. 

A new era began when Andrew Jackson of Ten- 
nessee became President of the United States. He 
was not only a soldier and immensely popular, being 
usually called " Old Hickory," but he had new ideas, 
some of them very bad and some of them very good, 
about governing the country. Instead of thinking 
himself, as he ought to have done, the head servant 



THE SEMINOLE AND BLACK HAWK WARS. 1 59 

of a country in which the people are the rulers, he 
administered the government as if it were his family 
estate. He was without fear, perfectly honest, but 
very headstrong, and not able always to control his 
temper. Secretary Marcy, in 1832, had said, " To 
the victors belong the spoil." Jackson began the 
shameful " spoils system," removing good servants 
of the government from ofHce, in order to put in 
his own partisans. Whereas not more than one or 
two hundred persons had been by the previous six 
presidents compelled to resign, Jackson turned out 
about two thousand. Thus began what was for 
many years our disgraceful civil service. 

Many people were afraid of Jackson because, in- 
stead of having had an education in books, or being 
a dignified Virginian, he was a " western " man ; 
and yet he soon showed that he had some grand 
ideas about the dignity of the United States gov- 
ernment. 

When South Carolina, after vainly protesting 
against the high tariff demanding free trade, de- 
clared that after a certain date the laws of the 
United States would be null and void, and that 
no duties on goods imported from Europe would 
be paid, and threatened secession. President Jack- 
son ordered General Scott to Charleston to enforce 
the laws. This was done, and instead of the 
" nullification " of the general government, it was 



l6o THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

the state legislatures resolution that came to 
nothing. 

Already in the Senate of the United States the 
battle, afterward fought in blood, had begun in 
words. Robert Hayne and John C. Calhoun feared 
that the tendency of the East and North was to 
centralize, and make the national government too 
strong at the expense of the states. These men 
upheld the extreme doctrines of state right, state 
sovereignty, nullification, and secession. On the 
other side Daniel Webster defended the Union 
and national supremacy in a series of remarkable 
speeches. These, widely read, thrilled the Ameri- 
can heart all over the land. They educated thou- 
sands of young men to be the patriots of 1861. 
The general effect of this great debate was to 
consolidate both the South and the North in their 
differing sentiments. Thus on a grander scale were 
debated the same great doctrines of national su- 
premacy and state right, the same problems which 
had been presented to the Federal Dutch republic 
in the days of Maurice and Barneveldt. Jackson's 
prompt action maintained the Union. Under Henry 
Clay's initiation a new tariff was adopted, which for 
a time satisfied and removed irritation. 

So prosperous was the country that, without any 
public debt, the surplus from the treasury was 
divided among the different states. The country 



77//'.' SEMINOLE AXD lU.ACK UllVK WARS. K^r 

was orowini;" rapidly. Pennsylvania coal, the best 
in the world, fed the steamboats Ihat were now run- 
ning in most of our large rivers, and the " black dia- 
monds " were everywhere in demand. New canals 
were being opened, and railways were constructed, 
most of them headed toward the Mississippi. The 
great express business was in its infancy. The 
foundations of Chicago had already been laid by 
the buildin<>- of a few lo**; cabins. There are still 
living men who can remember when this second 
city of the United States was but a collection of 
rude frame houses. 

M 



CHAPTER XVII. 

OUR NORTHWESTERN EMPIRE. 

JACKSON'S administration was especially noted 
for the vigor of our foreign policy. France had 
long owed us large sums from a long series of spo- 
liations at the end of the last and the beginning of 
the present century. Naples was backward and 
insolent in refusing to settle just American claims 
for vessels seized during the reign of Joseph Bona- 
parte and Murat. By able negotiations France was 
brought to pay up her debts, but Naples still refused 
to settle. 

Summoning Commodore Patterson, his old com- 
rade in the battle of New Orleans, Jackson ordered 
him to the Mediterranean. It was so arranged that 
six of our men-of-war should arrive, one after the 
other, in the Bay of Naples. This they did in hand- 
some style, ranging their guns opposite the main 
streets of the city. The result was that instead of 
the refusal at the beginning of the week, all claims 
were paid up before the following Sunday. 

To extend our trade in the far East, Mr. Edmund 
Roberts of Portsmouth, New Hampshire, was sent 
out on the man-of-war Peacock. He succeeded in 

162 



OUR NORTHWESTERN EMPIRE. 1 63 

making a treaty with the Sultan of Muscat and 
with the two kings of Siam. This opened Ameri- 
can trade with Zanzibar and the Malay Peninsula. 
Roberts also opened negotiations with Cochin- 
China, but was repulsed. He had intended also 
to go to Peking, and hoped to open trade with 
Japan, but died prematurely at Macao. Our for- 
eign commerce increased greatly under Jackson's 
administration. 

American enterprise at the ends of the earth was 
signally illustrated in the Wilkes exploring expedi- 
tion, from 1838 to 1842, which greatly enriched 
science. Most of the vast ice-hedged Antarctic 
continent was discovered and the Samoan and 
Fiji groups of islands carefully examined. Besides 
Graham, Alexandra, Wilkes, and Enderby lands, 
discovered by Commodore Wilkes, the American 
flag has floated over the Barber, Palmyra, .Prospect, 
Fanning, Christmas, Starbuck, Penrhyn, Swan, 
Pitt, McKean, and Hull islands in Polynesia. In 
later years the voyages of Kane and other Ameri- 
can explorers have made known the northwest- 
ern part of Greenland as far as discovered, called 
Lincoln and Grant land and Grinnel land on the 
opposite shore of Smith Sound. Not until recent 
times has our government made any serious attempt 
to make known the ownership of islands that are 
ours by right of discovery. 



164 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

Although we had no national debt, yet, because 
of so much speculation and unwise schemes, there 
broke out in 1837 ^ financial panic. Not long after 
that the Mormon movement began, which trans- 
formed Utah desert into a garden, and attracted 
many thousand emigrants from Great Britain, Nor- 
way, and Sweden. Steamship lines were estab- 
lished on the ocean, and millions of people crossed 
from the old fatherlands to the country whose 
wealth and power not even panic could paralyze. 

When in 1 845-1 846 the potato crop failed in the 
Emerald Isle, the Irish began to come over to our 
country by the hundreds of thousands. This led 
to new developments. Within a few years some of 
our eastern cities were practically controlled by 
Irishmen, for Patrick takes naturally to politics 
and has shown considerable ability in this line of 
achievement. Besides producing men eminent in 
every department of life, Ireland gave us many re- 
cruits for the regular army and militia, producing a 
noble type — the Irish-American soldier. The dark 
side of the Irish is seen in the great amount of 
drunkenness and liquor selling among them, and is 
especially shown in lawlessness and wild schemes, 
such as the so-called Fenian republic, which, after 
getting many thousands of dollars from servant 
girls and ignorant people, ended in 1866 and 1867 
in an absurd failure in an attempt to attack Canada 



OUR jXORrnWESTERN EMPIRE. 165 

from the Vermont frontier. Even as early as Van 
Buren's administration attempts were made to 
invade Canada, but the would-be invaders were 
scattered by Colonel McNab of the Canadian 
militia. One of the few American flags captured 
by the British and to be seen in a museum at Lon- 
don was taken about this time. 

After the United Kingdom, Germany has sent 
us the largest number of immigrants, followed 
in their order by Scandinavia, Austria-Hungary, 
Italy, and Russia. From 1820 to 1893 over five 
million German-speaking people entered the United 
States, forming excellent material for the building 
up of the national commonwealth, because soon 
absorbed and assimilated. All attempts to keep 
up foreign languages and peculiar Old World cus- 
toms and notions in the United States end sooner 
or later in failure. Common sense wins the day. 
Gaelic, Dutch, German, and French folks, even the 
old ones, find that God can be worshipped, friend- 
ships maintained, and business done just as well in 
EnHish as in the lanoruao-e of their ancestors. 

In the early forties, when the Dutch King Will- 
iam arbitrarily interfered with the affairs of the 
Reformed Church in the Netherlands, a large immi- 
gration under Dominies Van Raalte and Scholten 
set toward North America. The immigrants passed 
through the Mohawk Valley or up the Mississippi 



1 66 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

River to Michigan, Wisconsin, Iowa, and Nebraska, 
where dwell their descendants, now numbering over 
a hundred thousand, who are among the best people 
of the United States, 

Martin Van Buren was of pure Dutch descent, 
and one of the ablest of our statesmen. Under 
him the opposition to slavery was established in 
politics and a system of nominating presidential 
candidates in popular conventions carried out. The 
" free soilers " declared that Congress had no more 
power to make a slave than to make a king. The 
words of one political campaign song ran, " Van, 
Van, is a used-up man." Another one declared for 
" Tippecanoe and Tyler too." Indeed, from Jack- 
son's time, the American people seem to have had a 
characteristic weakness for military oflficers as presi- 
dents. The first presidents, both Federalists and 
Republican-Democrats, had been mainly civilians. 
The Democrats, after forty years of victory, had to 
yield now to the Whigs, whose standard-bearer was 
William Henry Harrison. He was called " the Log 
Cabin candidate," because after his military cam- 
paigns in the Northwest he lived on a farm, on a 
piece of land cleared of forest trees, on the banks 
of the Ohio. 

I well remember how in my boyhood the mantel- 
pieces were ornamented with small models, in stone 
or glazed earthenware, of a log cabin with a coon 



OUR NORTHWESTERN EMPIRE. 1 6/ 

on the roof and a barrel of hard cider standing by 
the door. Even in the great pohtical processions, 
many miles long, there were log cabins on wheels 
and a live coon on the ridge pole of each. Thus 
began the great presidential campaigns, inaugurated 
by the policy of Van Buren, with nominating con- 
ventions which blossomed out into enormous pa- 
rades with torchlights, "wide-awake" uniforms, bands 
of music, transparencies, banners, and many things 
funny as well as showy and expensive. 

President Harrison died within a month of his 
inauguration. Then our country had its first, and 
generally disagreeable, experience of vice-presidents 
becoming presidents, and John Tyler occupied the 
chair. During his administration Rhode Island 
gave up its antiquated government by charter and 
the old Dutch system of representation by towns 
instead of by voters. An agreement was made be- 
tween Great Britain and the United States, called 
the Webster-Ashburton treaty, by which war was 
averted, the Maine boundary fixed, and an Ameri- 
can squadron under Commodore Perry despatched 
to Africa, where already Monrovia had been located 
and settled by freed sla- viS from America, and Liberia 
had been erected into a republic. 

The next great invention, that of the telegraph, 
was to give the railroads an amazing development, 
lay nerves of iron, and send pulses of light under 



1 68 THE ROMAXCE OF COX QUEST. 

the ocean, and, indeed, give the world a new nervous 
system, annihilating space and time. Americans 
from the first were interested in and developed the 
science which has received its name from the Greek 
" electron," or amber, because this substance when 
rubbed attracts and holds hairs or bits of paper 
and generates " electric " force. Franklin, in Phila- 
delphia, drew sparks from the clouds and invented 
the liohtnino- rod. Professor Moses Farmer, of 
Eliot, Maine, was, after Benjamin Franklin, the great 
American electrician. Most of his experiments and 
machines anticipated what has since been accom- 
plished in electric traction, lighting, submarine ex- 
plosion, and telegraphing, — for all these things he 
accomplished before 1S50. Professor Joseph Henry, 
in the Albany Academy, had discovered that one 
could ring a bell at a distance, and get other work 
done by transmission of electric energies through 
a wire. 

Professor S. F. B. Morse, an artist, who, however, 
did nothing electrical, put Henry's discovery to a 
orand use. He invented what is called the Morse 
Alphabet of lines and dots, which made by a 
telegraphic transmitter could be read as letters, 
and so made into syllables, words, and sentences. 
Morse secured from Congress an appropriation of 
$y^>,ooo to have wires strung from Baltimore to 
Washington. In the Supreme Court room, in the 



OUR XOKTIIlVESTEKAr EM PIN I'.. 1 69 

capitol, lie sent and received the message from 
Numbers xxiii. 23, "What hath God wrought?" 
Ezra Cornell, of Ithaca, New York, was one of the 
first to see the vast benefits and commercial value 
of the new invention. As the Irish servant girl 
said, " He invented telegraph poles." Instead of 
stretching wires, two of them in the ground, he con- 
ceived the idea of stringing the iron threads, well 
insulated, up in the air and of using the earth as 
the return circuit. 

Almost as wonderful as this " far-distance writ- 
ing" were the other American inventions, which one 
after the other astonished the world, such as the 
grain elevator and steam shovel, the steam river 
dredge, wire-card and wire-weaving machine, the 
eccentric lathe, the revolver, the reaper and mower, 
the sewing machine, the ship's propeller, the steam 
printing-press, the type-writer, electric dynamos and 
motors, the telephone, phonograph, and hundreds of 
others. 

Our territory was again increased, in the spring 
of 1845, by the annexation of Texas. Sam Hous- 
ton, Stephen Austin, and many other Americans 
had settled in the country, then a part of Mexico. 
Tired of Mexican anarchy they had risen in arms, 
fought battles with Santa Anna, won a great victory 
at San Jacinto, and formed an independent republic. 
After more than one request for admission into the 



I/O THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

Union, Texas was annexed by a joint resolution of 
Congress. Thus a territory five times the size of Eng- 
land was added to the domain of the United States. 
James K. Polk's administration was marked by 
another tremendous expansion of the United States, 
both on the north and the south of the Pacific coast. 
Heretofore the great region of the Northwest, be- 
tween the Rocky Mountains and the Pacific Ocean, 
and between that part of the North American conti- 
nent claimed by Russia, and that part below claimed 
first by Spain and later by Mexico, was an unknown 
region not definitely belonging to any nation. Cap- 
tain Gray, in the ship Columbia, who first carried 
the American flag around the world, had named 
the Columbia River. Van Couver, a British sea 
captain of Dutch name, had made exploration of 
the waters around the island which bears his name. 
Young William CuUen Bryant, a boy just out of 
college, had written the poem "Thanatopsis," which 
for a generation or two afterward was a favorite 
on the school rostrum and elocution platform. In 
it occurs the w^ords suggesting distance, desolate 
silence, loneliness, and the unknown dead: — 

" Take the wings 
Of morning ; traverse Barca's desert sands, 
Or lose thyself in the continuous woods 
Where rolls the Oregon, and hears no sound 
Save its own dashing — yet, the dead are there." 



OUR NORTHWESTERN EMPIRE. 171 

It was known that there were splendid moun- 
tains, rivers, and fertile lands on that Pacific slope. 
Yet, though the Spaniards from Fcrrelo in 1543, 
and the Englishmen, Sir Francis Drake in 1578 
and Captain Cook, and numerous American ex- 
plorers and traders had visited the ocean's rim and 
the beach, none had gone inland to explore. Even 
the coast-line was but slightly known, until Captain 
Robert Gray, a Boston trader, entered the mouth 
of the Columbia River on the nth of May, 1792, 
and thus secured the foundation of the American 
title to Oregon. A trading post was begun in May, 
1 810, but abandoned in a few weeks. The Pacific 
Fur Company founded Astoria on March 22, 181 1. 
In 18 1 8 the United States and Great Britain made 
a treaty of joint occupation. The Hudson Bay 
Company was at first anxious to have the place 
kept unsettled, so that wild animals should be 
numerous and the crop of furs large; but American 
Christian people, obedient to their Master's com- 
mand, sent out missionaries as early as 1834. The 
Methodists founded a mission under Jason Lee, 
while the American Board sent out Rev. Dr. Parker, 
who was supported in part by the Presbyterian 
Church and by the town of Ithaca, New York. It 
was he who prevailed upon young Marcus Whitman 
and his wife to come out and help. The bride 
and groom, though warned that no passage on 



1/2 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

wheels could be made into Oregon, succeeded in 
crossing the mountains. 

Gradually other Americans came into the coun- 
try. This roused the fears and jealousy of the 
British, who wished to claim this region wholly for 
Great Britain. At a dinner table where Marcus 
Whitman was present, they expressed their inten- 
tion of occupying and taking formal possession of the 
Pacific slope, the following spring. Thereupon Whit- 
man determined to ride to Washington over the 
mountains, and prairies, and rivers, in the heart of 
winter and to state the case to President Tyler and 
ask that the country might be occupied by Ameri- 
can settlers. Dressed in frontier costume, he rode 
through the blizzards, forded or ferried the icy 
rivers, faced the storms, slipped past the hostile 
Indians, and, though often near the border line of 
death from cold and starvation, he reached in health, 
though terribly frost-bitten and nearly exhausted, 
the first place he could call home. This was on the 
doorsteps of Dr. Parker, in Ithaca, where still stands 
the house at which this heroic missionary, frontiers- 
man, and commonwealth builder arrived. 

From Ithaca Dr. Whitman went quickly to Wash- 
ington, and in the presence of President Tyler and his 
cabinet argued that the fair and fertile country of 
Oregon ought to be occupied by American settlers. 
Getting the government's encouragement, he at- 



OUR NORTHWESTERN EMPIRE. 1 73 

tractcd two hundred families, numbering seven 
hundred people, to the task of colonization and ex- 
pansion. With their long wagon trains they moved 
over the prairies, rivers, and mountains, during 
the summer of 1843. Settling in the valley of 
the Oregon, a provisional government was formed 
and the whole northwestern coast came under the 
American flao-. 

There was a good deal of diplomacy necessary 
before our exact northern boundaries were settled 
and our frontier rectified. Russia made claims 
which neither Great Britain nor the United States 
would allow, and the boundary line northward of 
the United States, from the Lake of the Woods, 
had not been settled by the peace of 1783. Yet, 
although there were great cries of " The British 
must go," and " Fifty-four forty, or fight," yet the 
two English-speaking peoples, by the Webster-Ash- 
burton treaty of 1846, settled their differences in a 
friendly way. The two nations agreed to divide the 
territory, the Americans taking the land between 
parallels 42 and 49, which included the great Colum- 
bia River and valley, and the British from parallel 49 
to Alaska. The actual boundary line was run by 
surveyors along the 49th parallel, and marked by 
stones and iron pillars placed a mile apart. 

Thus, once more, the Americans became expan- 
sionists, and increased the national territory by the 



174 iffE RoyrAXCF of coxqvest. 

addition of more territory than Texas eontained, — 
in Idaho, Washington, and Oregon, or two hundred 
and fiftv-five thousand square miles. All this was 
obtained by good diplomacy, without an ounce of 
powder or a drop of blood being wasted. 



CHAPTER XVIII. 

OLD " ROUGH AND READY " IN MEXICO. 

A GREAT many wars arise from mere questions 
of boundaries. Much bloodshed would have 
been saved in the history of the world if survey- 
ing had been properly attended to, and the chain 
and cross-staff had been brought in as proof of 
right, instead of ball and powder. The more en- 
gineering enters into questions of land, or what 
the Germans call " agrar-politik," the less likely are 
bloody quarrels to arise. 

William Penn and his heirs set the good example 
and precedent of having a correct line drawn by 
the best British men of science, and his heirs paid 
pounds, shillings, and pence for the good work done. 
Washington was as good an engineer and surveyor 
as he was a general and statesman. Wisely did 
President Cleveland recommend, and Congress ap- 
propriate money for, the Venezuela Boundary Com- 
mission. Great Britain was one of the first countries 
to be well measured and mapped, and to maintain 
an ordnance survey. W^ith us it became quite early 
the custom to send out from Washington geological 

*75 



1^6 THE ROMAXCF. OF CONQUEST. 

surveyors with exploring parties, so as to see what 
were the resources of the country. 

When new states, especially, are formed, it is 
above all things necessary first to have the boun- 
daries determined with exactness ; or, in Lord Bea- 
consfield's words, to secure a "scientific frontier." 
Yet when Texas was admitted as a state in 1845, 
this question was undecided. The Texans fixed 
their boundary line at the Rio Grande on the west. 
They also claimed that all the territory, up to 
the 42d parallel, on the northwest, was theirs. 
Mexico, on the contrary, drew the boundary at the 
Nueces River, or a hundred miles eastward. So 
here was one of those debatable strips of land, lying 
between a weak and a powerful nation and almost 
certain to be grasped and held by the stronger of 
the two. So it happened with the 50-mile " neu- 
tral strip " between China and Korea, which, after 
remaining unoccupied for two centuries, was in 
1877 possessed by the Chinese, and the frontier of 
China pushed many leagues nearer the rising sun. 
The policy of Li Hung Chang and President 
Tyler was the same. The President ordered Gen- 
eral Zachary Taylor to occupy the land. Old 
" Rough and Ready," as he was afterward called, 
built Fort Texas on the east bank of the Rio 
Grande, The Mexicans ordered him to leave. 
He refused. Then the Mexican infantry and 



OLD ''ROUGH AND READY'* IN MEXICO. 177 

lancers crossed over on what President Tyler in 
his message called " American soil." 

On May i General Taylor marched out with 
most of his troops toward Point Isabel, where were 
his supplies, then threatened by General Arista. 
In his absence an attack was made on Fort Texas, 
which was gallantly defended by Major Brown of 
the seventh infantry, after whom the fort was later 
named. When Taylor heard of the hostilities begun 
by the Mexicans, he started on May 7 to relieve Major 
Brown. General Arista, learning of this, drew off his 
forces, about six thousand strong, and in the tall grass 
at a place called Palo Alto waited for the Ameri- 
cans. A battle began which lasted five hours; but, 
although there was a good deal of firing and smoke, 
the two armies never got close enough to do much 
execution. In those days of smooth-bore muskets 
and "ball and buck," — the cartridges being made 
of paper and having at the end a big round leaden 
ball with three buck-shots, — men might fire all day 
without hitting each other, unless they got within 
a range of a few hundred feet. When the Ameri- 
cans charged, the Mexicans retreated with a loss of 
one hundred men. It was the splendid field-gun 
practice of the Americans that decided the battle, 
and though Major Ringgold was killed, yet " Ring- 
gold's light artillery " at once became famous. 

The next day Arista, having taken up his position 



178 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

behind intrenchments near the ravine of the pahn 
trees, or Resaca de la Pahna, which crossed the 
Matamoras road about three miles north of the 
town, hoped to annihilate Taylor's force. This 
time it was the cavalry that won the victory. Cap- 
tain Charles May, with his famous dragoons, made 
a gallant charge, sabring the Mexican gunners, cap- 
turing the cannon in the batteries, and pursuing the 
enemy to the river, making the victory complete. 

In place of the gay departure, a few days before, 
of brilliantly uniformed men, sallying out hopefully 
to expectant victory, cheered by the smiles and 
plaudits of beautiful women, was the return of a 
beaten army to Matamoras discouraged and dis- 
organized. On the 1 8th General Taylor crossed 
the Rio Grande and occupied the city, but was 
unable, from lack of supplies, to follow up his 
success. 

President Tyler sent a message to Congress, say- 
ing that the Mexicans had spilled blood on our 
territory ; but Abraham Lincoln, who was a member 
of Congress from Illinois, introduced what were 
called the " spot resolutions," demanding to know 
the exact spot where American blood had been 
shed. War was duly declared. When a call for 
fifty thousand volunteers was made, most of the 
states responded with alacrity, and the enthusiastic 
volunteers were at once put under discipline and 








CAPTAIN MAY'S CHARGE AT RESACA DE LA PALMA. 



OLD ''ROUGH A. YD READY'' IN MEXICO. I 79 

training by officers of the regular army. The 
country was determined that the miserable failures 
of 181 2 should not again be repeated. At this time 
our military officers in the upper grades were men 
of signal ability, having had long experience in 
rough lands and the Indian campaigns. The 
Southern States were especially forward, for the 
people who believed in servile labor expected to 
win a large amount of new territory, where black 
slaves should be worked without wages. Some 
Power, not ourselves, decided otherwise. It turned 
out that over all the new region there is not to-day 
a single slave. 

While the new army of militia was being formed, 
the regulars were waiting for reenforcements, supplies 
and means of transportation were being furnished, 
the iron ore in the ground was being transformed 
into ammunition, the hides fresh from the flocks 
were being tanned out and sewed into accoutre- 
ments, and all the supply train of a great army was 
being got ready ; the Mexicans also prepared for 
defence and gathered new forces. 

At the end of summer General Taylor moved 
forward into Mexico with his able assistants, Worth, 
Twigg, and Butler; he reached Monterey, which 
was a strongly fortified city and amply garrisoned 
under General Ampudia. Taylor began the battle, 
which lasted three days. There was heavy fighting 



l8o THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

and the batteries were taken by assault. Ampudia 
surrendered on the 24th. Taylor made generous 
terms, allowing the Mexicans to retire with their 
arms, though he kept possession of the city. 

The plan of campaign as at first made was to 
invade Mexico from the north by land and in three 
divisions, — the western, eastern, and centre. Such 
a campaign meant the spreading of our little army 
over a vast extent of hostile country where trans- 
portation would be difficult and the climate uncer- 
tain, while no vital blow could be struck at the 
enemy. Mexico, the land of the cactus, the eagle, 
and the serpent, was too large for scattered cam- 
paigns. Scientific warfare demands that the enemy 
be pierced in his vitals. 

The best strategy in 1846 required that the main 
army should land at a point on the seacoast nearest 
the capital and move at once to capture it, the city 
of Mexico. Geography is half of war. From the 
time of Cortez to the last invasion of Mexico, under 
Napoleon III, the invader's ships have always 
gathered at Vera Cruz, the Rich City of the True 
Cross. While the right wing of our army moved 
to California, and Taylor held the centre, Scott led 
the left wing by the sea to attack the city of Mexico. 
So the main preparations by the government at 
Washington — William L. Marcy being Secretary 
of War and John Y. Mason being Secretary of the 



OLD ''ROUGH AND READY" IN MEXICO. l8l 

Navy — were devoted to forming and equipping 
Scott's army. Two fleets, one of transports, which 
should carry the volunteers to Vera Cruz, and the 
other of war vessels, which should capture or block- 
ade the Mexican seaports, were fitted out. In the 
Pacific Ocean our warshij^s, under Stockton, were 
to keep the enemy in alarm, (ieneral Taylor had 
to yield to Scott most of his best troops in Quit- 
man's and Worth's division. I le thus became, 
for a time, little more than a drill-master of raw 
volunteers. 

At this time our flag had twenty-eight stars, for 
Texas was the twenty-eighth state admitted into the 
Union. Nine of the new states since 1783 had been 
first settled by the French, and one by the Spanish. 

The Army of the West, though smallest in num- 
bers, performed a work of great labor and with much 
hazard, though with very little popular notice or 
glory at the time. Most of this force, consisting of 
about eighteen hundred men, were volunteers from 
Missouri. Under General S. W. Kearny they 
moved against New Mexico and California. Across 
the desert, where there was danger of dying from 
thirst, beside perils from Indians and from endless 
toil, a march of two months began. On the iSth of 
August, 1846, they reached Santa Fe. While Colo- 
nel Price remained in command of New Mexico, 
General Kearny with one hundred cavalry soldiers 



I 82 THE ROMANCE OF COX QUEST. 

pressed on toward the Pacific waters. In this brave 
and hazardous undertaking he lost some of his men 
on the march and more in a battle at San Pasquel. 
When left with sixty troopers, expecting to be entirely 
cut off, he was delighted to find a rescuing party 
sent to him overland from our fleet. Our sailors, 
under Commodore Sloat, had taken possession of 
Monterey, in California, while Commander Mont- 
gomery had seized San Francisco. Captain John 
C. Fremont, an engineer officer in charge of a sur- 
veying party, had raised the American flag at several 
points. The story of this officer is one of the most 
romantic in American annals. 

Fremont was the son of a French immigrant who, 
though left an orphan at four years of age, made his 
own way in the world. Commissioned lieutenant of 
engineers, he became the great "pathfinder." He 
explored the Northwest, the Rocky Mountain re- 
gions, the wonderful scenery of high California, the 
Sierra Nevada, the San Joaquin and Sacramenrto 
valleys, and the Apache country. He thus made 
known the geography of our great far western 
regions. In 1845 he was again on his way to the 
Pacific. Receiving authority from Washington, he 
conquered all upper California, and surveyed the 
route for a great road from the Mississippi to San 
Francisco. He pierced the hitherto unknown coun- 
try of the terrible Apaches, and defeated them in 



OI.I) "ROVC.Il ./A7J KK.l/IY" IN MEXICO. 1 83 

battle. He reached Sacramento after a luiiKlred 
days of marching and surveying. 

y\h-eacly our American j)i()nc'ers had settled on 
the river. It was rumored that the Mexicans were 
negotiating with (ircat Britain for the sale of Cali- 
fornia, and that the Mexican Governor, General I)e 
Castro, was on the march. The settlers took up 
arms and joined I'^remont's camp. I laving caj)- 
tured a Mexican post with some cannon and mus- 
kets, he routed I)c Castro and his force on the 5th 
of July. The settlers declared themselves indepen- 
dent and elected Tremont Governor of the province, 
and the American forces, naval and military, were 
joined at Monterey. Other o]:)erations on the Pa- 
cific coast were the battles at San (Gabriel and the 
Mesa River, January 8 and 9, 1847, in which 
the Mexicans failed to regain the ground they 
had lost. Among other detached enterprises was 
the capture of Mazatlan under Commodore Shu- 
brick. 

Our navy made a brilliant record during the 
Mexican war, both on the Pacific Ocean and in 
the Gulf waters. Our blockading vessels were sta- 
tioned at Tampico, Tobasco, Alvarado, and Tuspan, 
and prevented supplies from reaching the enemy. 
I'he "mosquito fleet" of small gunboats was very 
useful for service in rivers, and several gallant ac- 
tions were performed in the capture of these sea- 



1 84 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

port towns. At the beginning, the chief officer in 
command was Commodore Conner. 

These were the days of the infancy of steam in 
war. The Missouri, the Mississippi, and the Prince- 
ton were about the only large war steamers in the 
American navy. So the Gulf squadron was divided. 
Commodore Conner, a veteran of the War of 1812, 
took charge of the sailers, and Commodore Matthew 
C. Perry of the steamers. Having no ships of light 
draught, Conner had been able to accomplish little, 
and the splendid opportunities of the first year 
were lost. So the main squadron lay idly off 
Sacrificios Island, out of range of Mexican forts. 
Spy-glasses were pointed daily at the fiag-ship for 
signals to begin action, but they did not come. 

Meanwhile, to rouse the drooping spirits of our 
tars. Perry planned the capture of Tobasco, where 
Cortez had fought his first battle. Here lay some 
vessels and boats, which were just the sort needed 
for the uses of the squadron. In the big steamer 
Mississippi, towing the Vixen, Bonita, Reefer, No- 
nita, McLane, and Foriuard, with two hundred 
marines from the frigates Raritan and Cnmbcrlaud, 
Perry dashed across the sand bar, almost before the 
Mexicans knew of his arrival, and captured the 
town. During the next two days, going up the river 
with the small steamers and boats to Frontera, this 
place also was seized, but after the treachery of the 



OLD "■ROUGH AND READY" IN MEXICO. 1 85 

Mexicans was bombarded and evacuated. Our 
squadron returned safely to Vera Cruz. New spirit 
was infused into the navy, and the name of Perry 
became a rallying cry. Tampico, 210 miles north 
of Vera Cruz, was the next place to be attacked. 
The city had sent a crack battalion and even an 
artillery company, made up of deserters from our 
camps, to Santa Anna's army. Indeed, the crafty 
Mexican hoped that all of General Taylor's Irish 
soldiers, who were Roman Catholics, would desert 
because three or four score had done so. In this 
Santa Anna was mistaken, for the Irishmen stood 
faithfully to the stars and stripes. Yet hoping both 
to weaken the Americans and to strengthen his 
forces with the Tampico garrison, Santa Anna 
ordered the city evacuated. As the fleet with the 
two commodores moved up the river, our men wit- 
nessed a beautiful sight. It was the star-spangled 
banner waving in triumph over the city, and hoisted 
by a woman's hand. The wife of the banished 
American Consul bravely remained and welcomed 
her countrymen. Captain Josiah Tattnall, who after- 
ward in China quoted the famous phrase " Blood 
is thicker than water," was sent eight miles further 
up the river, and captured the town of Panuco, 
Then Perry was despatched with " the pride of 
the navy," the steam frigate Mississippi, to New 
Orleans. 



1 86 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

It was considered a great thing, in those days, 
that this steamer was able to go so swiftly, first to 
Matamoras for reenforcements, to get troops from 
General Patterson for a garrison to hold Tampico, 
and thence to New Orleans to procure intrenching 
tools, wheel-barrows, a field battery, soldiers, and 
provisions, and within one week to deliver these in 
Tampico. Perry's next exploit was to capture the 
town of Laguna del Carmen, which he did hand- 
somely. He thus supplied plenty of good food for 
the squadron. 

General Taylor's battles were sanguinary, but not 
decisive. Mexico was too large to be affected by a 
little bloodshed on the northern border. Named 
after the tutelary divinity Mexitl, it is shaped like 
a cornucopia, 1950 miles long and 750 miles wide 
in its upper portion, and, tapering in the south, con- 
tains 756,232 square miles. It is so vast in area 
that most of the Mexicans hardly knew there was 
an American army on the soil. Hence the neces- 
sity of striking at the vitals of the country and of 
sealing the seaports. 

While Scott was still in the United States, gather- 
ing and drilling his army. Perry was sent north to 
have the Mississippi refitted and to collect light- 
draught steamers suitable for blockade duty. These 
steamers were the Scourge^ Scorpion, J^^suviiis, 
Hecla, Electra, /Etna, Stromboliy and Decatur. 



OLD ''ROUGH AiVD READY" IN MEXICO. 1 8/ 

What stinging and volcanic names ! Indeed, to 
savage and half-civilized men the first idea of a 
steamship is that it has a volcano at work inside 
the hull and used to turn the wheels. 

Santa Anna, relying on the strong fortifications 
at Vera Cruz to keep back the Americans, gathered 
a great army in the north, expecting to defeat 
Taylor and then turn against Scott. Hearing of 
the Mexican's approach with twenty thousand men, 
Taylor, who had only five thousand men, mostly 
new volunteers who had never been in battle, fell 
back to get the advantage of position on the plain 
of Angostura. This is near the beautiful place 
called Buena Vista, which means bellevue or fine 
outlook. The ground was composed of mountain 
ridges, narrow defiles, and impassable ravines. 

Taylor's fresh volunteers were enthusiastic, and 
had confidence in their commander. When he 
rode up and down the ranks and called them his 
" fighting cocks," they were ready to follow or to 
stand by their leader, come what might. They 
were dressed in blue roundabout coats, and blue 
trousers with white stripe along the side, and wore 
flat round caps. They carried muskets and white 
cross-straps and belt. 

The first battle, which began on Washington's 
birthday, was little more than a skirmish. The 
next day Santa Anna hurled his whole force with 



1 88 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

terrible energy upon the American column, but 
our men stood firm. Fortune varied. The Mexi- 
cans, after being repeatedly beaten back, returned 
resolutely to the charge. Both sides showed equal 
bravery and obstinacy. At last Santa Anna, find- 
ing that he made no progress, had to give up and 
retire. The American loss was about seven hun- 
dred, and the Mexican twenty-five hundred, beside 
a large number of deserters. The Americans were 
in control of the battlefield and of that district of 
country. 



CHAPTER XIX. 

THE NAVY AND ARMY AT VERA CRUZ. 

THE largest squadron that had heretofore ever 
assembled under the American flag — steamers, 
sailing ships, and bomb vessels — was put under 
command of Commodore M, C. Perry. Yet so 
economical was our government, that this Mat- 
thew, the brother of Oliver, the hero of Lake 
Erie, though called a commodore, was only a cap- 
tain with a broad pennant. The scores of trans- 
ports carrying the volunteers were delayed at the 
Bahama Islands, waiting for a change of wind, 
and there were passed by the swift steamers. 
After many of those vexatious delays, which so 
try the spirits of young volunteers, they at last 
caught sight of the crosses over the cathedral 
and churches in the Rich City of the True Cross, 
and perching on them the vultures, which in 
Spanish cities are the black scavenger angels. 
In 1899, after the Americans had cleared the 
streets of Santiago in Cuba, the vultures began 
to starve. 

As day by day ships came in with flags flying 



IQO THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

and bands of music playing, loaded with enthusi- 
astic volunteers from the North, a floating city 
gathered in the harbor, or rather the offing, of 
Vera Cruz. It was necessary to act promptly, 
however, for during six months of the year the 
vomito, or yellow fever, threatened the lives of 
all foreigners. The disease is bred through cli- 
matic conditions, but its coming is encourao^ed 
and its ravages are aggravated by the filth which 
gathers in most Spanish towns, where there is 
usually a lack of proper drainage. The other 
half year was marked by the northers, or terrific 
wind-storms from the north, which are very de- 
structive to shipping. In those days, there being 
no wharves or moles, ships lay at anchor at some 
distance from the city or fastened to iron rings 
in the walls. 

Preparations were now made for the landing of 
twelve thousand troops. To do this in the surf, 
out of range of the guns of the city and the great 
castle of San Juan d'Ulloa, was no easy task. 
Usually on such occasions, as for example at the 
French landing in Algeria, many men were 
drowned. By the skill of our naval officers and 
sailors, who used large flat boats made in the 
United States, all the soldiers, with artillery and 
supplies, were landed safely. 

Intrenchments were dug and cannon and mor- 



THE NAVY AND ARMY AT VERA CRUZ. 191 

tar platforms built. The line of circumvallation, 
when completed, was named Camp Washington. It 
was impossible for the army to march into the 
interior, and thus gain the healthy highlands, until 
the walled city of Vera Cruz had been reduced, 
and yet General Scott had only a pitiful array of 
ordnance to batter down the heavy walls built of 
coquina, or shell rock. Ten mortars and ten 24- 
pounder guns were indeed soon mounted, but the 
forty other mortars and the heavy guns were some- 
where at sea on transport ships, with no news of 
them or their whereabouts. Every day the dreaded 
yellow fever came nearer. Easily propagated by 
mosquitoes and flies, an outbreak among our troops 
would mean a ruinous pestilence. The light army 
cannon could not batter down the walls. To throw 
shells into the city would only kill women and 
children without making the enemy surrender. In 
such a strait, what could General Scott do } 

When Perry, on March 20, 1847, arrived back from 
New York, the Mexican batteries were firing in a 
lively way on our men and camps, but no response 
yet came from the American side. That night 
it blew a gale from the north, hiding the vessels in 
spray and the camps in sand. 

General Winfield Scott was one of the ablest 
officers that the United States army has ever 
known. Born in 1786, he entered the service in 



192 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

1808. He was not only a veteran of the War of 
181 2, in which he had won glory and a gold medal, 
but had served in the campaigns against the Indians. 
It was he who had elaborated the system of tactics 
which then formed the basis of instruction in the 
United States army. He was a thoroughly sci- 
entific soldier and a very humane man. He con- 
sidered it disgraceful to spill one drop of blood, 
or to have one life lost more than was necessary. 
Instead of " a big butcher's bill," and great lists of 
killed and wounded, his idea of war was to secure 
results without waste of human life by disease, bat- 
tle, or soldier's vices. Furthermore, he was desir- 
ous of inflicting no more loss upon the enemy than 
was absolutely necessary, though in time of need he 
spared neither his men nor the foe. He planned 
the campaign in such a way that much money, 
but little fight, would be required. Yet the Wash- 
ington authorities had not very liberal ideas and at 
first set Scott aside. Afterward they were obliged 
to recall him and put him in authority. His plan 
was to move immediately from the malarial seacoast 
up into the mountains, to capture Mexico City and 
quickly end the war. 

Santa Anna, however, calculated that Vera Cruz 
would hold out a lonor while. Then he expected 
that two of his allies. Commodore Norther would 
wreck the fieet, while General Vomito would ruin 



TFIE NAVY AND ARMY AT VERA CRUZ. 193 

the army. So, also, tlie Spaniards calculated in 
1898. 

Now at Vera Cruz, having opened his batteries 
and found his guns too light, Scott was bitterly 
disappointed. With all his greatness, he was an 
exceedingly vain man. Magnificent in stature and 
imposing in person, he, like so many other poor 
mortals, found it hard to give credit to others. So, 
although it is said that he once declined Commodore 
Conner's offer of heavy ordnance from the ships, yet 
he was now obliged to ask for the navy Columbiads 
which were to breach the walls and thus enable him 
to turn his face to the northwest and cry " Excelsior." 

At last the signals from the flag-ship came. On 
March 21, shortly after that hoisting of the colors 
which takes place daily on every American fort and 
man-of-war, our naval world was electrified by the 
signal, " Commodore Perry commands the squad- 
ron." The two commodores, Conner, veteran of 
the war of 1812, representative of the past and 
the glories of the sailing ship, and Perry, the apos- 
tle of steam and the future diplomatist, to open 
Japan to the world, at once visited General Scott in 
his tent. There the commander-in-chief asked for 
the loan of six heavy navy guns to form a battery 
in the army. Instantly Perry replied, " Certainly, 
General, but I must fight them . . . wherever the 
guns go, the sailors go with them." 



194 7W^ ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

Scott declined. His vanity was wounded. He 
wanted his own soldiers to man the batteries ; but 
" guns and men together " was Perry's rule. So 
Scott renewed the bombardment with his light field- 
pieces, only to find that he was wasting time. The 
shot could not penetrate or breach the walls. 
Swallowing his pride, he requested Perry to send 
the guns along with the sailors. 

The Commodore in person got into his boat, and 
pulling round under the sterns of his war-ships, 
announced the order. Instead of scraping and 
scrubbing and acting as laborers, our jackies were 
once more to uphold the glorious prestige of the 
navy. Already the marines were doing duty in the 
trenches as part of the third artillery. The news 
thrilled the blue-jackets, and cheer after cheer went 
up from our ships. 

It was Captain Robert E. Lee, one of the ablest 
American of^cers ever known on this continent, 
who built the naval battery, which in the circum- 
vallation was Number Fottr. Made of sand-bags, 
with walls over six feet thick, it had traverses to 
resist a flanking- or a rakino- fire from the castle. 
The guns were mounted on their own ship's car- 
riages and set opposite the fort of Santa Barbara. 
The sailors worked the guns and the powder boys 
brought the ammunition from trenches in the rear, 
behind which the supporting infantry lay. Picked 



THE NAVY AND ARMY AT VERA CRUZ. 1 95 

crews served two 32-pounclers from the Potomac 
and the Raritau, and four 68-pounders from the 
Mississippi, the Albany, and the St. Marys. 
These were called Paixhans or Columbiads, and 
were the most famous guns of the clay. They 
could fire bombshells, which the old-style can- 
non could not. Not until it was finished and 
the guns mounted, did the Mexicans discover the 
naval battery, which had been built behind cover, 
masked by the dense chaparral or cane-brake, so 
common in Mexico and Texas, made of evergreen 
oak and thorny shrubs. 

When our men found out, from the lively music 
of the Mexican cannon balls playing over their 
heads, that they had been discovered, they were 
as lively as the chaparral-cocks which live at 
home in the prickly undergrowth. Some daring 
volunteers at once sprang out of the embrasures 
and chopped away the brush. This unmasked 
the work, and soon the cross fire of seven forts 
converged on this one naval battery. The castle 
also sent big 10- and 13-inch shells flying over 
and around them, until Perry diverted its fire, 
as we shall see. 

The Mexican engineers wished particularly to 
destroy this new earthwork, for they well knew 
that it was the heavy shot from this battery which 
would certainly breach the walls. Indeed, as soon 



196 THE ROMAS'CE OF COX QUEST. 

as their inspectors picked up the soHd 32-pounder 
shot and one of the nnexploded 8-inch shells, 
they felt that the city must quickly fall. Their 
hope was therefore to dismount the guns, and 
knock the battery to pieces. They concentrated 
directly their heaviest cannon and best artillerists 
opposite the naval battery, and put in command 
a German officer named Holzinger. Yet, notwith- 
standing all they could do, the fort received very 
little injury. Captain Lee showed faith in his 
own work, by remaining in the redoubt during 
the fire. At half-past two, ammunition was ex- 
hausted, and the hot metal was allow^ed to cool. 
By this time fifty feet of the city walls had been 
cut away, and a breach thirty-six feet wide, big 
enough for a storming party to enter, had been 
made, while the thicker walls of the forts w^ere 
" drilled like a colander." 

A relief party from the ship, led by Captain 
Mayo, with fresh ammunition, reached the battery 
by sunset. Only the best sailors, picked from all 
the vessels, were allowed the honor of serving at 
the guns. All night long the bombardment w^as 
kept up from the mortars. At daylight the boat- 
swain's silver whistle called our sailors to breakfast, 
after which another terrific strais^ht-line bombard- 
ment began. So rapid and so steady w^as the fire, 
that between seven and eight it was necessary 



THE NAVY AND ARMY AT VERA CRUZ. 1 97 

to stop and let the guns cool. From daybreak 
to I P.M., our shipmen sent over six hundred 
S-inch shells and solid shot into or within the 
city walls. They silenced several forts and 
wrought terrific destruction, for the difference be- 
tween bombs falling downward and shot fired on 
a level is like that between a broadside and a 
rakins: fire at sea. The lono^er rang^e is so much 
more destructive, because it has a vastly greater 
area of damage. Beside several officers and men 
killed in the battery, a number of the sailors were 
wounded by the cactus spurs and thorns, and bits 
of sand bags. Before leaving his work, so hand- 
somely done, Captain Mayo called his men to the 
ramparts to give three cheers and thus to draw 
the fire of the Mexican forts. But none came. 
All were silenced. So after thirteen hundred 
rounds from the naval battery and great breaches 
in the walls, which thus opened the city to assault. 
Captain Mayo mounted his horse at 2 p.m. and 
rode to the headquarters of the general command- 
ing, to announce results. In his joy, Scott almost 
pulled Captain Mayo off his horse, thanking him 
and the navy, in the name of the army, for this 
day's work. 

It was now arrans^ed that three stormino; col- 
umns should be formed, — one of marines and sail- 
ors, one of rec^ulars, and one of volunteers. The 



1 98 THE ROMAXCE OF COX QUE ST. 

\olunteers were to enter through the widest breach 
made by the navy guns. The others were to storm 
the o-ates and cHmb the walls. Havino- no other 
materials, the carpenters of the Mississippi sawed 
up the studding sail booms to make ladders. The 
white flag and signals of surrender precluded any 
necessity of the Americans showing their valor. 

Meanwhile the navy had still further cooperated 
handsomely with the army. Seeing that the cas- 
tle was training its guns to destroy, if possible, 
the naval battery, Perry ordered Tattnall, with 
the Spitfire and ly.xr;/, to approach, and at the 
distance of eighty yards to open fire in order to 
divert the gunners from the naval battery. The 
plan succeeded admirably. Had the Mexicans 
been good artillerists, they could have blown the 
little steamers out of the water, but their shots 
vexed only the waves. After they had swung their 
heavy cannon round, but as soon as they had im- 
proved their range, Perry called off the saucy brace 
of " mosquito steamers," on which the sailors were 
being very much wetted by ball and shell, which 
splashed up the brine like geyser springs. Tatt- 
nall was rather disappointed to find hardly any 
one hurt. In the thrill of delight, while still on 
deck, he exclaimed. " Well, this shortens life, but 
it broadens it."" 

Unconditional and immediate surrender was the 



THE NAVY AND ARMY AT VERA CRUZ. 1 99 

only proposition made, and this was accepted. A 
terrible wind-storm, though there was bright moon- 
light, followed. IMuch to the surprise of General 
Scott the castle also surrendered, the moral effects 
of the naval battery being sufficient. Alvarado was 
soon after captured, furnishing our army with ani- 
mals for transportation, so that General Scott was 
enabled to move up into the interior. 



CHAPTER XX. 

SCOTT's advance to the city of MEXICO. 

Up to the time of the Mexican war the sailors 
of the United States navy had a great preju- 
dice against being drilled as infantry. Operations 
on land by seamen, except in a very irregular way, 
had been very rare. With the coming in of steam- 
ers, where so much less toil is required in the 
handling of sails and ropes, and where most of the 
hoisting and other heavy work of the ship, formerly 
done with human muscle, is now accomplished by 
machinery, the situation was changed. The time 
was ripe to turn sailors into soldiers and to form 
a naval brigade, and the opportunity was well im- 
proved. Our blue-jackets are now so well drilled 
in the evolutions of infantry that in the parades 
and processions they show a handsome equality 
with our militiamen, not only in marching, but in 
evolutions and the manual of arms. 

Commodore M. C. Perry was the first one to form 
a naval brigade. With ten pieces of artillery, twenty- 
five hundred men were thoroughly drilled, first to 



SCOTT'S ADVANCE TO THE CITY OF MEXICO. 201 

handle musket and bayonet, and then to move in 
company and battalion formation. While Scott 
was forcing the pass of Cerro Gordo, Perry's ships 
crossed the bar at the river's mouth, stormed the 
fort, and Tuspan was " taken at a gallop." 

The next enterprise was to capture Tobasco. 
This was new work for United States sailors; for in- 
stead of ship-to-ship duels, boat expeditions or squad- 
ron fights in line, our sailors were to charge against 
infantry intrenched behind earthworks. With 1084 
seamen and marines in forty boats, the ships towed 
the expedition seventy miles up a river covered on 
both sides with dense chaparral. With three cheers 
and a charge the men landed, formed, drew their 
howitzers up the hill, and marched on Tobasco. 
On the plain before the city they met the Mexican 
army, with two-field pieces and cavalry, commanded 
by General Bruno. Our artillery was first hand- 
somely served, and then a charge put the Mexicans 
to flight. While the steamers poured their fire 
into Fort Iturbide, Lieutenant, afterward Admiral, 
Porter landed with sixty-eight men and captured 
the fort by assault, so that soon our men marched 
into the town, company front, the band playing 
"Yankee Doodle." During the six days' occupancy, 
the sailors showed that they could act like good 
soldiers on land as well as keep discipline aboard 
ship. 



202 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

Thus beside furnishing the battery which laid 
low the walls of Vera Cruz, and released the army 
to march into the interior, the navy captured six 
cities with their fortresses and ninety-three cannon, 
all of which work was done on land, off deck, and 
beyond the usual sphere of naval operations. No 
wonder that when General Scott sent the flagstaffs 
conquered from the city and castle of Vera Cruz to 
the museuni of West Point, Commodore Perry re- 
quired that on the brass plates should be inscribed, 
not " Taken by the American army," but " Taken 
by the American army and navy." 

Meanwhile, one of the most splendidly conducted 
scientific campaigns known in history went on under 
the presiding genius of General Scott. Our little 
army of twelve thousand men climbed up the Mexi- 
can mountains, and at the almost inaccessible pass 
of Cerro Gordo found the Mexicans too strongly 
intrenched to be attacked in front. Scott cut a 
road around the mountain, and on the 1 7th of April 
reached the Jalapa road, where he could strike Santa 
Anna in the rear. Early in the morning of the 
1 8th, Scott ordered his men forward. With a furi- 
ous rush, our blue-coats charged on the gayly uni- 
formed Mexicans. Colonel Harney, taking some of 
his men, captured the tower, which was the key to 
the whole position ; while General Pillow's division 
moved through a terrible musketry fire upon Gen- 



SCOTT'S ADVAiVCE TO THE CITY OF MEXICO. 203 

eral Vega's force. Though driven back, they re- 
formed and charged again with success, gathering 
in three thousand prisoners. In this battle our 
men lost four hundred and thirty-one, of whom 
sixty-three were killed. The Mexican army was 
routed. Five thousand stands of arms and forty- 
three pieces of artillery were taken. The result 
was the occupation of Jalapa, with its fine climate 
and splendid scenery, dominated by the snow-capped 
peak of Orizaba. 

Many were the jokes cracked by our brave fel- 
lows, who had never seen the fair city or region of 
Jalapa. They remembered the nauseous purgative 
drug exported from this city, when " calomel and 
jalap " formed one of the favorite prescriptions of 
the doctors. Indeed, this was the period in which 
many " Dago " words and expressions grew up. 
Our volunteers used to sing in camp, " Green grow 
the rushes, O," and hence the name, in South 
America, of the North Americans as " Gringoes." 
This was also one of the first wars in which new^s- 
papers made some men famous and destroyed the 
reputation of others ; for the war correspondent had 
already moved into American history and begun his 
career. General Taylor was called " Rough and 
Ready," and General Scott " Fuss and Feathers." 
Some of the sayings on the battlefield got to be 
very popular, such as "A little more grape. Captain 



204 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

Bragg," " Wait, Charlie, till I draw their fire," and 
" Where the guns go, the men go with them." 

Our banners now advanced into the beautiful 
province of Puebla. The country was noted for its 
richness in silver and other metals, and the lovely 
Mexican onyx with which we are all acquainted. 
On this highland region Scott's army spent the 
summer. Besides beincr reenforced, it was brought 
into a superb state of discipline. When, on the 7th 
of August, the cry " On to Mexico " was changed 
into a quickstep march, and our men set forward 
with cheers, Scott did not fear to meet an army 
twice the number of his own. On the 20th, fourteen 
miles from the city, the first one of three battles on 
the same day was fought and victory won. Although 
the Mexican troops showed stubbornness and bravery, 
they could not withstand the charges of our men. 
The line of battle moved off to Churubusco, six 
miles south of the city, where heavy fighting took 
place. Three thousand prisoners were taken and 
thirty-seven cannon were captured, our army losing 
by death and casualty 1053 men. The third fight 
on this eventful day completed the victory, the 
Americans keeping up the chase of the beaten foe 
almost to the very gates of the capital. 

Then, instead of Scott's being able to move at 
once upon the city, to harvest the results of his 
victory, an armistice of fifteen days took place. 



SCOTT'S ADVANCE TO THE CITY OF MEXICO. 205 

The war was stopped, as it were, by injunction, 
through a commissioner invited from Washington. 
Scott was thus left with his httle army in the heart 
of the enemy's country, where his supplies and 
reenforcements could easily be cut of¥, while the 
Mexicans were able to recover and reorganize. 
Negotiations failed, however, and on the 7th of 
September Scott prepared to advance. On the 8th 
Worth's division of four thousand men captured 
Casamata, and also the fortification called Molino 
del Rey, or the King's Mill. 

One tremendously strong fortress now remained. 
This was called Chapultepec, where was the mili- 
tary school of the Mexican republic. It stands on a 
strongly fortified hill, and an immense amount of 
money and skill had been spent to make the place 
impregnable. To mask his real purpose, Scott 
ordered two batteries of artillery to keep up a heavy 
fire, during September 12 and 13, which had the 
effect of drawing the enemy within the city walls. 
Meanwhile our engineers put up heavy batteries on 
the night of the i ith, which, during the two days 
following, directed their fire on the castle and out- 
works. Then on the 13th, at eight o'clock in the 
morning, under Captains McKenzie and Casey, two 
assaulting parties, of 260 men each, moved forward 
to the stronghold, while over their heads there fell 
upon the enemy from our batteries a rain of shot 



206 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

and shell. Over rocks, and chasms, and mines, and 
in the face of heavy fire of cannon and musketry, 
our men rushed forward, climbing up, without giv- 
ing the Mexicans time to explode the mines laid in 
the ground. After the redoubt midway on the 
heights had been taken, our brave fellows reached 
the ditch and main wall of the work, putting scaling 
ladders up against the masonry. No sooner were 
the pioneers once inside than it looked as if a wave 
of blue were falling over the walls and mounting up 
the west side. 

On the south side our men had to move across a 
causeway, and here the contest was desperate ; but 
discipline and valor overcame every obstacle. Bat- 
teries and works were carried. Ever higher yet our 
soldiers moved forward, until they planted the stars 
and stripes at the highest point. During these 
three terrible days our army lost 863 men, but not 
stopping, they pressed on along the two causeways, 
and continued the fighting at the city gates. Scott 
would grant no terms, and the divisions of Worth 
and Quitman entered the capital. Although street 
fighting continued during two days, the position was 
held, and the city made secure. Scott had now less 
than six thousand troops. 

After this decisive victory some occasional skir- 
mishes took place, but the guerillas were more an- 
noying than dangerous. The whole story of the 



SCOTT'S ADVANCE TO THE CFTV OF MEXICO. 20/ 

American army in Mexico is a magnificent tribute 
to the science, skill, and character of our generals; 
to the splendid discipline of our Httle army ; to the 
moral stamina and intelligence of the American 
volunteer. The contrast between the ability of the 
officers and the discipline of the rank and file in the 
War of 1812 with that of 1846 is as great as one 
could imagine. 

The Mexican soldiers were docile and brave, and 
were accustomed to stand in the ranks during the 
firing, calmly meeting death ; but when the Ameri- 
can troops made a rush and charge, they were un- 
able to hold their ground. The United States 
soldier was not only stronger in body and a better 
fighting machine, but was a more intelligent person. 
He had had a public school education. He knew 
what he was fighting for. He could not only be 
brave, but he could keep up his courage and endure 
hardness, amid fatigue and danger during many 
hours. Many, perhaps most, of the city-bred men 
in the army were also members of the volunteer fire 
department at home. This, with all its faults, was 
an admirable school of alertness, intelligence, cour- 
age, discipline, and manliness. After standing up 
to heavy fighting, and shooting with an idea to seri- 
ous business, our volunteers, when once they could 
start the Mexicans on the run, rapturously enjoyed 
the excitement. They found the chase in war to 



2o8 THE ROMAXCE OF CONQUEST. 

have more fun and exhilaration than if tliey were 
runnino- to a fire or racin"' with a rival enoine. 

o o o 

Nor was it ditTficult to account for the brilliancy 
of our victories, when it is also considered what 
splendid olificers the American graduates of West 
Point were. These outgeneralled the Mexican 
leaders by exact science. General Worth well 
deserved the monument which the city of New 
York erected to his memory on Fifth Avenue, 
opposite Madison Square. 

In the navy two great reforms begun and were 
soon carried out. One was the abolition of flog- 
o^inof and the other of the srros: ration. Altosfether, 
about 100,000 troops had been employed, of which 
26,090 were regulars, 56,926 were volunteers, and 
over 15,000 in the navy or in the department of 
commissariat and transportation. About 120 offi- 
cers and 1400 men fell in battle or died of wounds, 
and 100 officers and 10,800 men perished by dis- 
ease ; or, in round numbers, about 20,000 lives were 
lost, one-fourth by the casualties of war, and three- 
fourths by sickness. The total expense of the war 
was about $150,000,000; but this sum was vastly 
increased by pensions. 

Buena Vista was Taylor's last battle, but he had 
won a victory not only over Santa Anna, but over 
the hearts of the American people, who are easily 
captured by military men. The name of the site 



SCO 7^7^ 'S ADVANCE TO Till': CITY OF MEXICO. 2O9 

of victory, from whicli General Taylor stepped into 
the presidential chair, was once unheard of in our 
country. It is now applied to over forty towns and 
villages in the United States, 

Old " Rough and Ready " was the son of the colo- 
nel of a Virginia regiment in the Revolutionary 
War. He had spent most of his life on the fron- 
tier, among soldiers and Indians. He began his 
military life in 1804 ^s lieutenant of the seventh 
infantry, and had served in the Black Hawk and 
Florida wars. By his battle on Christmas Day, 
1837, he had decisively beaten the Seminoles, and 
with Worth's diplomacy had virtually ended the 
Florida war. It is said that he had not voted for 
forty years. In the nominating convention his name 
ran ahead of those of Clay, Scott, and Webster. 

In the election the popular vote for Taylor was 
1,360,752. Cass and Butler, the Democratic candi- 
dates, had 1,219,962 votes. For Van Buren and 
Adams, the " free-soilers," only 291,342 ballots were 
cast. So the man of the camp was called to the 
service of the nation in the presidential chair. He 
was inaugurated March 4, 1849. 

The country was now again called to face the 
problems of expansion, and great questions loomed 
up concerning the organization of the new territory. 
The forces of freedom and slavery were being ar- 
rayed in that terrific conflict of words which pre- 



210 THE ROMAXCE OF COXQVEST. 

ceded the bloody struggle on the battlefield. Like 
the majority of purely military officers called to high 
civil posts, Taylor was destined to prove a failure as 
President. As a rule, the work of arniy officers in 
high civil administration contrasts pitifully with the 
achievements in the field. Usually the two records 
are like those of pygmy and giant. President Tay- 
lor was saved from further troubles by his death, 
which occurred July 9, 1S50. Millard Fillmore, 
whose name was destined to be well known in 
Japan, became President. 

By the treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, peace had 
been secured and New Mexico and California were 
ceded to the United States. Thus again the area 
of our country, by being increased one-third in 
size, was vastly enlarged. Nearly a million square 
miles of land, having over three thousand miles of 
seacoast, with three great harbors, came under the 
American flag. 

And yet this great territory might have waited 
a long while for inhabitants, had it not been for 
what has been called the " accidental "" discovery of 
some shininq; o^rains of crold. These were found 
on Captain Sutter's farm. 

Do we call the discoverv of frold in California an 
accident? Yet what is an accident.^ In Christen- 
dom, and especially in the United States, many 
wonderful inventions have been the result of happy 



SCOTT'S ADVANCE TO TIIF. CITY OF MEXICO. 211 

"accidents." Yet such accidents do not occur in 
the middle of Africa, or among the Esquimaux, or 
the red Indians, and not often in countries where 
people are not educated to think, or where dis- 
covery is frowned upon and research is considered 
dangerous to religion or the government. Span- 
iards and Indians were in California, the latter 
thousands, and the former hundreds of years, but 
there were no such " accidents " as the finding of 
gold. When, however, trained Cornish miners came 
to California, they found at an unexpected moment 
what their habits of life taught them to look for. 

When the news of this discovery went over the land 
and the world, the name " California," from having 
been a mere name in a romance, or a geographical 
expression for an obscure region, was transformed 
into an allurinsf imaq;e whose face reflected lioht 
and magnetism all over the earth. Immediately 
young men from the East, the returned volunteer, 
the hardy and venturous European from old lands 
across the sea, were attracted to the Pacific slope. 
With the " prairie schooner," slowly and painfully 
making their way across the great American desert, 
they thronged in caravans. Or they came in sail- 
ing vessels around Cape Horn ; or took steamer, 
crossed the Isthmus, and again embarked and 
steamed up the coast. In four years two hundred 
and fifty thousand men of every sort of character. 



212 THE ROMANCE OE CONQUEST. 

almost wholly without women and the refinements 
of life, were on the new El Dorado. Then began 
the digging and the washing, and the output of 
that volume of wealth which has surprised the 
world. Yet California's wealth from precious metals 
has been vastly less than that gained from tilling the 
soil. " The Argonauts of '49" found the true golden 
fleece in agriculture and not in mining. 

Another cession of territory was made in 1853, 
when Mexico sold to our government for the sum 
of $10,000,000 that part of Arizona and New Mexico 
that lies south of the Gila River. This " Gadsden 
purchase," named from the negotiator, added to our 
national domain a strip of territory nearly as large 
as the state of New York, or 45,535 square miles. 



CHAPTER XXI. 

THE AMERICAN SAILOR IN THE FAR EAST. 

OUR early war-ships on the East India station, 
which inckided at first the waters of China 
and Japan, were the old sailing frigates, sloops of 
war, or brigs. The first United States war steamer 
to get to the far East w^as the San Jacinto. She 
was named after the closing battle in the war of 
Texan independence, fought April 21, 1836, between 
General Houston and Santa Anna. In 1855 this 
vessel took out Townsend Harris, who made a 
treaty with Siam and one with Japan. This latter 
opened the empire to American residence and com- 
merce. 

While the Sa7i Jacinto was on the China station, 
the British and Chinese were having a quarrel which 
ended in war. The Chinese had built forts near 
Canton, to form a barrier that should hinder for- 
eign .vessels from coming up the river. The man- 
darins paid little or no attention, as they ought to 
have done, to the difference in the national ensigns. 
Although they themselves usually sent armies to 
the field with thousands of banners, streamers, and 

213 



J 14 THE ROM A WE OE COXQCEST. 

c\cn l.iiis. uinlMt'llas, .nul l:,imi*;s. — things which arc 
iu>nsciisc when rc.il ti;;htini; is to he ilonc, — so that 
the miml>cr as coniparcil with the t'lghtini; men was 
ahsuiiiU' _L;riMt, thc\- hail wo real tlag. rhc\- luul 
not \iM icachcil that clcai- sense ot natitnialitv in 
the woiKl which wouKl tiMch them to ha\e a dis- 
tincti\e Chim^se ensit;n ol their own. liuleeJ. there 
was no rcalU national tla^; of Japan ov Korea, until 
contact with western nations compellccl these pei^- 
l^le io make i>ne. in the priile anil conceit i>l her- 
mits, each thought his country the centre ot the 
unixcrse ami other people harharians. h'ach nation 
has mw\- a natiiMial stamlarJ. 

So it happencil that when .American ships, which, 
hein^; iH-rtectK ncutr.il. luul a right to pass the har- 
rier torts, were tircil upon, it w.is time to teach the 
Chinese m.nularins the rights oi neutrals aiul the 
l.iws ot w.ir. C\MnnuHlore .Armstrong coiiKl not get 
his tlag ship, theX?;; /<?<■.' 'V A', into the sh.iUow ri\er. 
so lie oiilcrcil Cipt.nn I'oote. who atterw.iiil was 
.Ailmir.il .iiul comm.uulcil the gunho.its on the Mis- 
sissippi, to go up the rixer, homh.iiil, cajUure, ami 
ilcstroN the Chinese tort. The l\'rfsnioNf/i was .i 
s.iilin^ ship, aiul haJ to he towcil hv the little 
.\meric.in ^tc.uncr 11 '://<t ///(•//('. The /.c:'<7//A an 
i^Kl wiHulen war-shii\ w.is pulK\l up hv tlie steam- 
launch A'.uf/i /\?. hut she struck on a rock .nul couKl 
not tight that ilav. The Chinese opencil at once 



rill: AMi.Nir.w sMioN ix rill' iir r.t.sr. m^ 



with i;i;i|><' iiiul loiind sliol, Ixil mIIci llic /'()//\//i(>i///i 
i;()( iiilo |)()sil ion, her (S-mch _i;ims l)("L;iiii lo kiux k I lie 
L;r;inilc Mocks ol tlic I;ii"l;csI iiikI lowest loil oiil ol 
llicir |)I;i(('S, while her sliclls hiiisl inside I he w.ills 
with teniric clicct. By cvciiini; the fori was ahiiost 
silent. 

After several days ol inia vailing', di|)lonia( y, a land 
attack was ordered. I'onr hnndred ol onr marines 
and sailors in hoals lowed hy the A'li/ii /wr weri' 
landed at Ihe ed^c of a riee-field. ihen, with lad- 
ders, axes, carbines, and cutlasses, they ( hari.M'd 
upon I he iL^ales ol thelort. liesides their jini;al halls 
the C hint'se Incd rockets made ol hanihoo poles 
armed with an iron s|)eardiead and leathered al the 
ends. I he clinnsy missdes made a terrihie wonnd 
when Ihey hit any one; hnl holli their ( aniion and 
jint^al balls Hew over om' men's heads and Iheir bam- 
boo rocket ari'ows wtnit hissini; and bonncint; over 
the fields like; P'ourth-of-j nly chasers. While our 
men were charL;in<_;-, the Lnuiii/ and /'<>r/siii<>/(//i kept 
n|) t heir cannonade, but both shi|)S ceased riling as 
soon as the Americans enlered within the loit. 
'I'hen the garrison broke and lied. ( )f the 17^) 
li^nns captured within Ihe walls, one was an .S-inch 
bron/.e piece weighiniL;" nileen tons. 

This was one of the bravest exploits of our men 
abroad, and the seven men killed in ihe battle are 
commemorated in the inonument at the iJrooklyii 



2l6 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

Navy Yard. It was easy to recall their story, when 
in July, 1898, just before going to Europe, I visited 
the Portsmouth lying as the receiving-ship in the 
Hudson River at Hoboken. The Portsmouth in 
her day was a fine sailer and in every way a useful 
ship. 

Our old friend Commodore Josiah Tattnall, whom 
we last saw in front of the castle at Vera Cruz, came 
out to Chinese waters in 1S60. In the chartered 
steamer Toeywan (another name for Formosa) he 
was to carry the American minister, Mr. Ward, into 
the Peiho River, which is up in the north of China 
and leads past Tientsin to the capital. The Brit- 
ish and French were at war with the Chinese, who 
built forts in a line, and below and above had 
stretched heavy booms of wood held together with 
iron chains and staples. In the attack, the allied 
fleet of thirteen gunboats, under Admiral Hope, 
blew up one boom and bombarded the fort, but 
they were unable to force or blow up the upper bai^- 
rier of timber and iron. In fact, being caught in 
the narrow river under the short-range fire of the 
heavy guns of the Chinese forts, several of their 
ships were sunk. On others, the gun crews were all 
killed and wounded. About four hundred and thirty 
men had been struck down, and the situation was 
dreadful. Even on the flag-ship Plover, only the 
bow gun was being served. 



THE AMERICAN SAILOR IN THE FAR EAST. 21 J 

Commodore Tattnall standing on deck outside 
the bar, glass in hand, was a witness of this awful 
spectacle. He stood it as long as he could. Then 
crying out, " Blood is thicker than water," he ordered 
the ship's cutter. He passed, like Perry on Lake 
Erie, through the thickest of the fight, as his men 
pulled oar toward the British commander's ship. 
A Chinese cannon ball tore into the stern of the 
cutter, killed the coxswain, and narrowly missed 
sinking the boat with all on board. Ranging up 
alongside, Tattnall leaped on board and offered the 
use of his surgeons for the wounded of the fleet. 

While their commander was thus occupied, his 
boat's crew of American sailors jumped on board 
the Plover, relieved the British sailors, who were 
utterly exhausted, and served the gun. Our men 
fired a round or two at the Chinese fort, and then 
Tattnall, though he hated to do it, ordered his men 
off. There was a growl in his voice, put on for 
official purposes, but there was no disapproval in 
his twinkling eyes. Afterward, in the land expedi- 
tion, Tattnall helped to tow boatloads of British 
marines in action to storm the forts. 

It is an old Scotch proverb that says, " Blood is 
warmer than water." Tattnall gave it his own or 
the English form, and made it " thicker." His 
action, although technically a violation of interna- 
tional law, must be excused when it is remembered 



2l8 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

that the Chinese at that time did not care anything 
about the laws of nations, and that the American 
Commodore offered the services of his surgeons to 
the Chinese also, which they declined. The Chinese 
have never been very much interested in saving the 
lives of their men wounded in battle. Even in 1894 
they went to war with Japan without a hospital corps. 
Until Christian sentiments prevail in China, they 
are not likely to furnish surgeons, hospitals, and 
nurses to their soldiers. 

In Japan large squadrons flying the stars and 
stripes have gathered more than once, but for 
peaceful purposes, and to perform those acts which 
have bound Columbia and the Mikado's empire in 
permanent peace and mutual regard. Commodore 
Matthew C. Perry, in July, 1853, with the United 
States steamships Mississippi and Susquehanna 
and the United States ships Ply month and Sara- 
toga, entered the bay of Yedo, and delivered the 
President's letter of friendship. In March, 1854, 
he came again, and at Yokohama, Perry, the sailor- 
diplomatist, and the professor-statesman Hayashi, 
made the treaty which begun the modern inter- 
course of Japan with the world. Townsend Harris, 
our first Consul-general, after many months of 
patient instruction of the hermit-statesman in Yedo, 
and later assisted by Commodore Tattnall, obtained 
a more liberal treaty, in 1858, which secured trade 



THE AMERICAN SAILOR IN THE FAR EAST. 219 

and residence of Americans at five ports and in two 
cities. Thus did our peaceful diplomacy win the 
friendship and respect of a proud-spirited people, 
and the most progressive nation in Asia — "the 
rudder of the whole continent." 

When the daimio of Choshiu erected batteries on 
the bluffs commanding the narrow strait of Shimo- 
noseki, tried to close the Inland Sea, and fired on 
the American ship Pembroke, Captain David Mac- 
Dougal, in the United States corvette Wyoming, 
then in search of the Alabama, steamed into the 
straits, July i6, 1862, and there performed one of 
the most brilliant and darino: feats in the annals of 
the United States navy. He engaged five batteries 
and silenced one. He ran his ship between two 
armed vessels, fought both and sunk one. Then 
manoeuvring into position, he sent an i i-inch 
shell into the boiler of the large war steamer, blow- 
ing her up and sinking her, again fighting the 
batteries on his return. In this battle of seventy 
minutes, the Wyoming fired fifty-five rounds, or, 
from the time of actual firing, one a minute. Struck 
in twenty places, the ship, though losing four killed 
and six wounded, came out in good trim. 

In 1864, the allied British, French, and Dutch 
and American squadrons bombarded the forts, now 
increased to ten, and completely destroyed them. 
Our flag was represented by Lieutenant Pearson, 



220 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

with a Parrott rifle gun and thirty marines and 
sailors, on the chartered steamer Ta Kiaiig, in a 
manner to win the admiration of the admiral com- 
manding. Then the alert and progressive Japanese 
took the matter to heart and concluded first to imi- 
tate, and then excel, the foreigners, and join in the 
race of modern civilization. 

As nobly patriotic and efficient at the ends of the 
earth as in American waters, our navy has always 
sustained the honor of the nation. Shimonoseki 
was the precursor of Manila. Cool, scientific, brave, 
and bold, MacDougal, in 1862, set a mark for Dewey 
at Manila in 1898. 



CHAPTER XXII. 

CONFEDERATES AND FEDERALS. 

THE battle over slavery was fought on the floor 
of Congress, before its theatre was transferred 
to the open field. One party at the North believed 
slavery to be a curse. Another party at the 
South looked upon it as a blessing. The pulpit, 
the press, and political economy were divided, as 
the country was. 

Even the religious denominations of the coun- 
try were rent asunder, but the Reformed, the 
Congregational, the Episcopal, and the Roman 
Catholic churches maintained their unity. The 
longer the debate, the hotter grew the spirit of 
the disputants. Texas was the last one admitted 
as a slave state, but California came in free. 

All compromises were in vain. One party cried 
" no more slave states." Another said that 
negroes were property, and every citizen of the 
United States could take what was his own, in- 
cluding his black slaves, with him. A third part 
denied the right of Congress to decide the ques- 
tion of free or slave states, declaring that the 
people of the territories were the sovereigns. 



222 THE ROMAXCE OF COXQVF.ST. 

Many blacks cscai)ed from Ixindagc into the free 
states. Congress passed a law allowing slave owners 
to secure the fugitives. When these attempted 
to do so, there were riots and rescues. 1 well re- 
member some (A these in Philadelphia, in many 
l")laces, especially in Pennsylvania, New York, and 
Ohio, kind-hearted persons helped the black people 
to get i)rivately to Canada. I^y day they fed and 
sheltered the fugitives in barns and cellars. When 
it was dark, they convoyed them from one town 
to another, or showed them the way. Thus these 
pilgrims of the night followed the north star to 
freedom under the British tlag. Quiet, secret, effec- 
tive, was "the underground railroad" to Canada. 

Mr. Seward declared that we had on hand an 
" irrepressible conflict," and Mr. Lincoln said 
that no nation could exist half slave and half free. 
There was much talk, which greatly scared some 
parsons and many persons, about " a higher law " as 
being above acts of Congress. Then came the pub- 
lication of the novel " Lhicle Tom's Cabin," which 
showed lH>th the bright ami the dark side of slav- 
ery. This book sold by hundreds of thousands and 
roused the popular sentiment, educating millions 
to a hatred aoainst the bondaoe of the blacks. 

When Clay, Webster, and Calhoun died, as they 
did before 1852, new men like Thaddeus Stevens 
and Charles Sumner, on the one hand, and Jeffer- 



cox /■'/■: PKR.rjW'.s ,i.v/) federals. 223 

son Davis and John C\ Brcckcnridge on tlie other, 
took their places in Conorcss. The Missouri Com- 
promise of 1820, which shut t)ut slavery from the 
territory north and west of Missouri, was repealed. 
This precipitated a great struggle for the posses- 
sion of Kansas. Should it be settled by free men 
or slaveholders } Soon there were rival govern- 
ments on the soil, and for five years the territory 
was torn by civil war. Border ruffians and aboli- 
tionists fought each other, and not a little blood 
was shed; but Kansas finally entered the Union 
without slavery. 

Two days after President James lUichanan had 
been inaugurated, the Supreme Court of the 
United States under Chief Justice Taney decided 
that negro slaves were not " persons," notwith- 
standing that the Constitution speaks of them as 
such, but were simply pieces of property having 
no rights which white men were bound to respect. 
Therefore slaves could be taken into free terri- 
tory, the same as horses or cattle. 

In the midst of the increasing hostilities between 
the sections north and south, came the financial 
panic of 1857. This was followed, however, by the 
discovery of silver in Nevada, of petroleum in 
Pennsylvania, and, later, of lead and silver in Colo- 
rado and Utah, and of natural gas in western Penn- 
sylvania. Then ensued the episodes of the John 



224 THE ROMA.WCE OF CONQUEST. 

Brown raid at Harper's Ferry, and the election to 
the presidency of Abraham Lincoln. By the ist 
of February, 1861, seven states had seceded from 
the Union. At Montgomery, Alabama, they took 
the name of the Confederate States of America. 
Fort Sumter was attacked and surrendered. Presi- 
dent Lincoln issued his call for 75,000 volunteers to 
suppress the rebellion. By the middle of June, 
four more states having seceded, there were eleven 
in the Confederacy. 

The population of the Union at this time was 
about 32,000,000, of whom 23,000,000 were in the 
states loyal to the Constitution, while in the Con- 
federacy were 6,500,000 white men and about 
3,500,000 slaves. The Confederates had the advan- 
tage of plenty of arms and ammunition which they 
had seized, and a majority not only of the best- 
known officers in the regular army, but perhaps 
also of the navy. They had also the benefit of 
resources in labor, by which an army in the field 
could be fed by unpaid toilers at home. There was 
an immense advantage in fighting for defence and 
on their own soil. On the other hand they had few 
factories and very little skilled labor. For the mak- 
ing of an ironclad war vessel, the ore must first be 
blasted, dug, smelted, refined, and rolled. The raw 
materials for the making of powder and campaign 
supplies must be first provided. Reliance must be 



CONFEDERATES AND FEDERALS. 22 S 

placed upon Europe for nearly all manufactured 
articles. Payment could be made in cotton through 
the blockade runners. 

The resources of the North in money, materials, 
factories, mills, founderies, and shipyards were very 
great. There were twice as many men, and labor 
was in honor. With command of the sea and the 
power to obtain a large navy, the government could 
blockade the southern ports and cut off supplies 
from Europe. Yet, in the summer of 1861, the 
Union force was but little larger than those of 
the Confederacy. General Scott directed one army 
and General Beauregard the other. The Union 
line, between Fortress Monroe and Harper's Ferry, 
was called " the x^rmy of the Potomac." The "Army 
of Northern Virginia " was the name given to the 
Confederate force, which had Richmond as its cen- 
tre. There were also opposing forces in Missouri 
and West Virginia and in the southwest. The 
Confederates held the Mississippi River from New 
Orleans to Columbus and hoped to control Ken- 
tucky, beside holding the Tennessee and Cumber- 
land rivers. 

The battle of Bull Run served only to arouse 
the North to greater efforts. Congress voted to 
raise a half million men and half a billion dollars 
to carry on the war. General George B. McClellan 
was put in command of the Army of the Potomac. 



226 THE KOM.WCE OF COXQUEST. 

Bv his continuous labors and after six months of 
steady drill, he had made it the splendid fighting 
machine which it was and through all its vicissi- 
tudes remained. The plan of campaign, elaborated 
in Washington, was first to blockade the seaports 
of the Confederacy, to take Richmond, to open the 
rivers of the southwest, and to march a Union army 
from the Mississippi to the Atlantic Ocean. 

The contrary plan, elaborated in Richmond, was 
defence on land and aggression at sea. A tieet 
of privateers and commerce-destroyers, among 
which were the Alabama, Florida, Shciiamloah, 
Rappahannock, Georgia, and TallaJiasscc, was let 
loose on the oceans. Their success was so great 
that the commerce of the United States was wiped 
off the seas. Americans dwelling in foreign lands 
felt like men without a country. 

In November, iS6i, Messrs. Mason and Slidell 
were sent as envoys of the Confederacy to obtain 
recognition abroad, but Captain Wilkes, the famous 
explorer, stopped the British mail steamer Trent 
and took them as prisoners. Yet the very thing 
that the American commander had done was 
what we had protested against for fourscore years. 
When, therefore, the British government demanded 
that the prisoners be given up, Mr. Seward, our 
able Secretary of State, at once released them. 
Thus our government showed that consistency 



\ 



COA'J'EDEKATKS A\D I-EDERALS. 22/ 

whicli is so precious a jewel. In Europe the two 
envoys accomplished little or nothing. Even Mr. 
Edward A. Ereeman, who started to write a book, 
entitled " The History of Federal Government 
from the Amphictyonic Council to the Disruption 
of the United States of America," published but one 
volume. Then the victories of the Union armies 
compelled indefinite postponement of the book. 

The efforts of the Confederates to build, float, 
and equip a navy were extraordinary. Seizing the 
Norfolk Navy Yard, they turned the old Merrimac 
into an ironclad. It had sloping sides, and its plat- 
ing w^as chiefly of railroad material. Although a 
very shaky craft, the new monster, riding on the 
old hulk, was able to move out against the grand 
old wooden frio^ates Ctimbcrlaiid and Congress, then 
lying opposite Fortress Monroe. These were 
rammed and sunk in a few minutes, their broad- 
sides rattling on and rebounding from the dented 
but uni^ierced iron sides of the Merrimac. 

On Sunday, March 9, a new oddity, the Monitor, 
appeared. She looked to the Confederates like a 
" tomato can upon a shingle." A duel took place, 
and the Merrimac went back to her quarters. The 
Monitor could not be hurt. This little event dic- 
tated the reconstruction of all the navies of the 
W'Orld. From this time forth wood, as a material 
for war vessels, was obsolete. In our days of steel 



22$ THE ROMAXCE OF COXQUEST. 

battle-ships, even the libraries of books, the sailors' 
bags, clothes, hammocks, and everything combus- 
tible are thrown overboard, lest they take fire in 
battle. 

The war of power between guns and penetrating 
missiles, armor and power of resistance, goes on in 
our day just as it went on in the iNIiddle Ages. At 
first leather and hide-covered shields were sufficient. 
Then followed chain mail and scale armor; but 
when the arrows were made lono-er and heavier 
and the bows stronger, chain and scale armor gave 
way to plates riveted together, and this in turn to 
ugly and clumsy boxes of iron, that made men look 
as if thev were dressed up in ash cans and coal scut- 
tles. Men thickened their coats of defence, clothinQ- 
themselves more and more in hardware, until the 
knights were so heavy that they had to be helped 
to get on their horses. When they fell off, they 
lay helpless as turtles turned upside down. 

By and by, in the final evolution of force from 
the stone-headed arrow, the bullet came into play, 
which no amount of steel which a man is able to 
wear can resist ; armor was dropped and became 
only a curiositv. So in time will it be with ship 
armor. Admiral Dupont, when he saw how life 
was made so uncomfortable to the fighters in the 
monitors, longed for iron men to fight in these 
metal ships, which were niore like junk-shops or 



CONFEDERATES AXD FEDF.RALS. 229 

dry docks than the beautiful, full-sailed, and majestic 
sailers of old times. During the war most of the 
best work of blockade and battle had to be done 
necessarily by the wooden frigates and gunboats, 
but new monitors were quickly built and launched, 
and they served nobly to reduce fortresses. In one 
of them, the Wcchan'kcn, Ca})tain John Rodgers, 
with consummate coolness and skill, fought and 
sunk, within fifteen minutes, the ironclad Atlanta 
in Savannah harbor. This event took place just 
fifty years after the conflict between the Chesapeake 
and Shannon in Boston harbor, and finely illustrated 
the progress made in naval science during a half 
century. 

The line of defence of the Confederacy was first 
broken in the west by the capture of Forts Henry 
and Donelson. This was brought about by Com- 
modore Foote with his gunboats and by General 
Grant with his army, compelling the surrender of 
fifteen thousand prisoners, which up to that time 
was the greatest number ever taken in any battle 
on this continent. After the great battle at Shiloh, 
or Pittsburg Landing, in which twenty-five thou- 
sand men were killed or wounded, Commodore 
Foote captured Island Number Ten, which opened 
the Mississippi River all the way to Vicksburg. 
One of the popular songs of the war was, " Ho, for 
the Gunboats, Ho ! " 



230 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

The next year Farragut, with fifty wooden ves- 
sels, moved up the Mississippi. New Orleans 
was defended by Forts Jackson and Philip, by 
heavy chain cables stretched across the stream, 
and by fifteen armed vessels, including two iron- 
clads. Farragut was assisted by Butler's land 
forces and Commodore Porter's bomb boats 
which rained 300-pounder shells into the forts. 
The advancing Union fleet silenced the guns, 
broke the cables, and sunk the ships. Once 
more the stars and stripes floated on the public 
buildingrs of New Orleans. Port Hudson and 
Vicksburg remained to contest and prevent the 
desired meeting of the sea-going fleet of Farra- 
gut with the river gunboats of Foote. 

In the east, McClellan, leaving a hundred thou- 
sand men in Washington, marched with another 
hundred thousand through the peninsula between 
the James and the York rivers to the southeast 
of Richmond, where weeks were spent in fighting 
malaria, mud, weather, and water. There were 
heavy battles at Seven Pines and Fair Oaks and 
opposition at Williamsburg and Yorktown. When 
General Robert Lee took command of the Con- 
federate forces, he despatched Stonewall Jackson 
to drive out the Union forces from the Shenan- 
doah Valley and General Stuart to make a raid 
in the rear of McClellan's army, and both were 



CONFEDERATES AND FEDERALS. 2^1 

very successful. The armies of Fremont, Banks, 
and McDowell were united under the name of 
the Army of Virginia, and General John Pope was 
made their commander. Toward the end of June, 
after heavy fighting, during what has been called the 
Seven Days' Battle, culminating at Malvern Hill, 
the Army of the Potomac retreated to the James 
River and afterward fell back nearer Washingrton. 
After the loss of thirty thousand men, matters on 
both sides stood as they had been before. When 
President Lincoln called for fresh volunteers, the 
shout went up all over the Union, " We are com- 
ing. Father Abraham, three hundred thousand 
more," and they came. 

A second terrific battle was fouo^ht at Bull Run, 
in which Pope, confronted by Stonewall Jackson, 
was badly defeated. Most of the Federal troops 
retreated to their fortifications at W^ashins^ton. 
General Lee crossed the Potomac above Washinof- 
ton, expecting that the Marylanders would rise up 
and march with him. At Harper's Ferry Jackson 
captured the Union garrison with plenty of arms 
and stores. McClellan, advancing to Sharpsburg 
against Lee, fought the bloody battle at Antietam, 
with a loss of twenty-six thousand men. Lee was 
compelled to retreat. McClellan was superseded 
by Burnside, who, setting out to march on Rich- 
mond, crossed the Rappahannock River and at- 



232 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

tacked the Confederate fortifications, but was 
driven back with terrible loss, and General Joseph 
Hooker was given the command of the army in 
the east. In this month of December, a battle 
was fought at Murfreesboro, Tennessee, between 
the armies of Generals Bragg and Rosecrans, 
lasting three days, and ending in the advantage 
of the Union army. Thus the year closed. 



CHAPTER XXIII. 

THE WAR FOR FREEDOM. 

/^N the first of January, 1863, the Emancipation 
^-^ Proclamation changed the character of the 
war from one for the Union to one for freedom. 
During the first four months of 1863 httle could 
be done except in the way of preparation, but 
when the Army of the Potomac moved, the Confed- 
erates met them at Chancellorsville, where a two 
days' battle was fought. The Union army was 
beaten. Yet this was the last triumph which the 
Confederates in Virginia won in the open field. 
Here they met with their greatest loss, for Stone- 
wall Jackson was accidentally shot by his own men. 
After this no more victories came to the stars and 
bars. 

General Lee was a statesman as well as a soldier. 
To save the Confederacy, he resolved to invade 
the free states and to conquer peace in a northern 
city. In June he "marched over the mountain 
wall " with about seventy thousand men, but at 
Gettysburg, General Meade, the Pennsylvanian, 
met him. Years before, a British officer visitine 
this valley plain, with Seminary Ridge on one side 

233 



234 ^^^^ ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

and Cemetery Ridge nearly opposite, had remarked 
on the fitness of the site for a great battle. 

On July I, 1863, the terrific struggle began, the 
Confederates at first getting the advantage. On 
the third day. General Pickett, with fifteen thousand 
men, the flower of the Confederate army, after a 
terrific cannonade of the Union forces, charged 
across a mile of open ground and up the slope 
of Cemetery Ridge. Then the Federal artillery 
opened upon them, first with round shot, then with 
shell, and finally with grape and canister. Yet on 
the brave Confederates moved, piercing the Union 
lines, but only to have the Federals close upon 
them, " gathering in flags by the sheaves and pris- 
oners by the thousands," and driving back the 
fragments. Being on Pennsylvania soil, the Key- 
stone State's own troops appropriately took a 
prominent part. In this most stubbornly contested 
battle of the war nearly fifty thousand men were 
killed or wounded. This was the high-water mark 
of the slaveholders' rebellion. The rest .of the work 
of the Union armies and navies, heavy as it proved 
to be, was but the finishing of the task. 

As I write this story, I remember well being at 
Camp Curtin, in Harrisburg, as a member of 
Company H of the 44th (Merchants') Regiment, 
Pennsylvania Volunteers, having heard the news 
of the battle of Gettysburg and received orders to 



THE WAR FOR FREEDOM. 235 

march southward. We were to guard the fords 
of the Potomac after Lee's retreat. Governor 
Andrew Curtin came into the camp and went 
through it, announcing the fall of Vicksburg. 
Before leaving Philadelphia, I had been solemnly 
assured by some, especially by two venerable and 
famous friends of southern birth, that Vicksburg 
was impregnable. With battery rising above bat- 
tery on the bluffs of the riverside, and bristling with 
heavy guns and an ample garrison in fortifications 
of the first order of scientific construction, it was 
impossible for an army to capture and occupy it. 

As Governor Curtin went through the camp the 
men of the various counties came out to greet him. 
There were the stalwart lumbermen from Pike, 
Wayne, and Susquehanna counties, the coal miners 
of Schuylkill, Carbon, and Lehigh counties, the 
farmers from Bucks, Montgomery, and Chester 
counties, the sugar makers of Clinton, Union, 
and Lycoming counties, the sturdy " Pennsylvania 
Germans " from Lancaster, Lebanon, and York 
counties, the iron workers of Allegheny and West- 
moreland counties, the boat and lake men from 
Erie and Crawford counties, — each delegation 
cheering and welcoming the governor of the com- 
monwealth. Thus did the boy of nineteen get his 
first clear and full impression of an American state, 
with its counties and townships. 



236 THE ROMANCE OF COXQUEST. 

General Grant's forces had beaten those of Pem- 
berton and Johnson, while the Federal artillery 
bombarded the city day and night. Food had 
become so scarce in Vicksburg that it was a ques- 
tion whether the wolf or the olive branch would 
eet inside first. With marvellous courafre and 
endurance, the Confederates held out until July 4. 
Then the army and the city surrendered. Five 
days later, Port Hudson followed the example. 
Then the mighty river was open from its source 
to the sea. Perry's old steam frigate the Missis- 
sippi grounded under fire of the batteries and was 
burned. 

Two "fires in the rear " now disturbed the Union 
cause. One was an outburst of ruffianism in the 
city of New York, when rioters tried to resist the 
draft. After burning a negro orphan as3dum, 
the cowards melted away at the appearance of the 
famous Sixth Corps of veterans. In Tennessee, 
Kentucky, Indiana, and Ohio, Morgan's Confed- 
erate cavalry made a destructive raid, only to be 
finally captured and destroyed. 

In the battle of Chickamauga in September, 
Brao-cr defeated Rosecrans, thous^h General Thomas 
saved the day. For two months the Union army 
was besieged by Bragg in Chattanooga. Late in 
November, when Hooker and Sherman came to 
command, they fought a battle above the clouds, 



THE WAR FOR FREEDOM. 23/ 

driving the Confederates from Lookout Mountain 
and Missionary Ridge. The Confederates fled to 
Dalton, Georgia. Their cause was further weak- 
ened by General Sherman's raid into Mississippi. 

On the 3d of March, 1864, General U. S. Grant 
was made commander-in-chief of all the Union ar- 
mies. In the plan of campaign arranged with Sher- 
man, it was decided that Grant should move aoainst 
Lee and Richmond, while Sherman should defeat 
Johnson and march to the sea. The two Union 
armies were to unite near Richmond. 

The last bloody and decisive campaign which sent 
the Confederacy to oblivion, gave us a united coun- 
try able to face the world. Grant began his ad- 
vance May 4. In the region of country called the 
Wilderness were fought indecisive battles, which, 
however, weakened the Confederates. The con- 
flicts in the Wilderness were almost exclusively 
fought by infantry and with bullets, for both cavalry 
and artillery were nearly useless. Indeed, these 
were the most terrible musketry battles known in 
the history of the world. Grant then moved by the 
left flank southward, where at Cold Harbor he 
hurled his men upon the enemy's intrenchments 
and lost over ten thousand men within an hour, in- 
flictinor also o-reat loss. 

Finding himself unable to take the direct line of 
advance against the elaborate fortifications of Rich- 



238 THE KOMAXCE OF CONQUEST. 

mond, Grant moved round southward to Petersburg. 
At once both armies dropped sword and musket and 
began with pick and spade. Two grand Hues of 
fortification, a comparatively short distance apart, 
were constructed. Beside a line of ditches and 
embankments, with bomb proofs, embrasures, and 
flanking guns, there were covered roads by which 
the men of either army in the reserve camps could 
reach their casemates. There were also regularly 
constructed forts at intervals along the line of forty 
miles or so, and a terrific and wasteful bombardment 
was kept up a large part of the time. During the 
whole campaign one battery on the right of the 
Union line, "the Petersburg Express," sent a shell 
every fifteen minutes, day and night, into various 
parts of the Confederate 'fortifications. Thus the 
winter passed away. In June, 1864, came news of 
the sinking of the Alabama by the Kearsarge. 

To divert Grant's attention, weaken his force, 
and make him relax his grip, Lee sent General 
Early with a division of veterans to menace Wash- 
ington. This able general got within five miles of 
the capital's fortifications. The Sixth Corps was sent 
up the Potomac and was personally met in Wash- 
ington by Mr. Lincoln. Getting out in the open 
fields beyond the lines of defence, they drove Early 
off, after he had helped himself freely to the cattle 
and horses of the Maryland farmers. In return, 



THE WAR FOR FREEDOM. 239 

General Grant in August sent Sheridan into the 
Shenandoah Valley, with a force of Union cavalry, 
to destroy everything that could furnish food. The 
" granary of the Confederacy " was so utterly wasted 
that "if a crow wanted to fiy the length of the val- 
ley he must take his rations with him." To-day, 
some of the most picturesque ruins in Virginia, cov- 
ered with the creeper and the trumpet-fiower vines, 
are memorials of the ruin wrought by Grant's orders. 

In the Union army were mechanics of all kinds. 
Every trade and craft was represented. A study of 
the various regiments was very interesting, because 
the difference in the ways of doing things, of begin- 
ning or getting at a problem and solving it, varied 
so greatly among the different regiments. Accord- 
ing as the majority of men, in each one, might 
be fishermen, shoemakers, lumbermen, machinists, 
farmers, clerks, cowboys, or miners, did habits and 
methods differ. In one of the Pennsylvania regi- 
ments was a large number of coal miners. They 
were as much used to burrowing under ground as 
are moles or rats. From them came the susfo-estion 
of digging an underground gallery and of making a 
mine under the Confederate fortifications, by which 
a fort could be blown up and a breach made, so that 
the Union forces could rush in, pierce the centre, 
divide and capture Lee's army. 

To discover the site of the mine, of which they 



240 THE ROMAXCE OF COXQUEST. 

learned from deserters, the Confederates went to 
the great trouble of sinking many shafts or pits in 
the tough clay, but they could not find the subter- 
ranean chamber. iMeanwhile the Pennsylvanians 
burrowed under ground and placed four thousand 
pounds of powder in the chamber. Then, after 
lighting a time-fuse, preparations were made to 
assault. But through misunderstanding the whole 
affair was mismanaged. After the engineering 
work had been well done and the mines sprung, the 
explosion blew up a company of men, horses, and 
guns, making a breach several hundred feet long, 
which was called " the crater." The wary Confed- 
erates, having been warned beforehand, rushed so 
quickly to the repulse that hundreds of Union men 
were slaughtered in the hole, and others made pris- 
oners. 

Sheridan, after long and careful preparation, moved 
on Early's force in the Shenandoah Valley, and sev- 
eral battles were fought. While the general was 
away, the Union army was surprised at Cedar 
Creek, and getting into a panic were badly driven 
by the Confederates and had their camps looted. 
General Crook re-formed the Union forces, and 
Sheridan, arrivinsf from Winchester, the battle 
turned to a victory. Indeed, Crook was a power- 
ful intellectual force and one of the hardest fighters 
in Sheridan's armv. To him much of the credit 




MARCH TO THE SEA. 



THE WAR FOR FREEDOM. 24I 

of this triumph, and not a little in other victories 
of Sheridan's, is due. 

Meanwhile, Sherman had been marching from 
Chattanooga to Atlanta, where the chief railway 
centre and factories of the Confederacy were. Bat- 
tles were fought at Resaca, Dallas, and Kenesaw 
Mountain. Yet neither opposing armies, nor the 
roughness of the hilly country, nor the steady down- 
pour of rain during three weeks, nor the burning 
of bridges and tearing up of railways by the re- 
treating Confederates, checked the Union advance. 
Sherman's men fought, built, relaid, and destroyed. 
Like a vast mowing machine, cutting a swath of 
destruction sixty miles wide, the Union army moved 
onward. Though he had lost thirty thousand men, 
Sherman captured Atlanta, burning all public build- 
ings that contributed in any way to keep up the 
war. It was hoped in Richmond that Sherman 
would have to turn back in order to help Thomas, 
who was being pressed by General Hood; but leav- 
ing " the Rock of Chickamauga " to take care of 
himself, Sherman set out with his face toward the 
sea, two hundred miles distant. For a month no- 
body in the North heard anything from him. The 
slow and sure Thomas in mid-December attacked 
General Hood, demolished his army, and ended the 
war in the Southwest. On the 2 2d of December 
Sherman from Savannah wrote to President Lin- 



242 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

coin, offering him as a Christmas gift the city of 
Savannah, with one hundred and fifty heavy guns, 
plenty of ammunition, and twenty-five thousand 
bales of cotton. On the ist of February, after a 
month's rest, Sherman set his face northward, mak- 
ing a seven weeks' march through mud, rain, and 
swamp, besides fighting a battle at Goldsboro. On 
March 27, at City Point, Virginia, he and General 
Grant shook hands. 

Meanwhile, Farragut and his fleet attacked Mo- 
bile. The Confederates, using torpedoes, blew up 
and rendered useless the monitor Tecumseh. Fur- 
thermore they had the Tennessee, an ironclad, com- 
manded by Captain Franklin Buchanan, who had 
also fought the Merrimac. It was built of materials 
which only a few months before had been timber in 
the forest and ore in the ground. Yet Farragut did 
not hesitate to attack the forts and ironclads, and 
even to ram and try to sink the iron monsters with 
his wooden ships. After a heavy battle in August, 
he was victorious over all opposition, and sealed 
up the port of Mobile while the army garrisoned 
the city. 

Like the constricting coils of an anaconda, the 
Union armies now closed on General Lee's forces. 
Sheridan moved down the Shenandoah Valley, cut 
the railroads and canals from Lynchburg, cutting 
off supplies from the West, and the next day moved 



THE WAR FOR FREEDOM. 243 

further southward. While Lee was thus occupied 
with Sheridan, Grant ordered an advance along the 
whole line, capturing Petersburg, and compelling 
Lee to retreat from Richmond, which was soon 
occupied by our forces. Then driving forward the 
fragments of a once great army, he secured Lee's 
surrender at Appomattox Court House. There 
generous terms were made and food was immedi- 
ately distributed to the hungry. Five days after- 
ward, on the same day that the Confederates had 
won their first victory. Major Anderson hoisted over 
Fort Sumter the very same flag he had lowered four 
years before. Thus ended the war that had cost a 
half a million of lives, and probably $5,000,000,000. 
On some days the expenses of the United States 
government were over $3,500,000 a day. 



T 



CHAPTER XXIV. 

A UNITED COUNTRY. 

WO magnificent pageants, the one material and 
the other moral, were witnessed at the end of 
the war. For the first time since iS6i the armies 
of the East and of the West made one host in 
Washington. On May 23 and 24, 1865, Pennsyl- 
vania Avenue presented a spectacle, the like of 
which had never before been seen on the American 
continent. In a column thirty miles long, the 
bronzed war veterans marched from the capitol up 
Pennsylvania Avenue past the Treasury Department, 
the reviewinsf stand where the President and his 

O 

Cabinet stood, and the White House. Magnifi- 
cent the display of Sheridan's thirteen thousand 
cavalry, ponderous the rumbling of three hundred 
pieces of artillery, funny beyond all telling the 
sight of Sherman's " bummers," wonderful the array 
of the pontoon train, pathetic the eloquence of the 
torn battle flags, and brilliant the sheen from miles 
of bayonets as the sunbeams played upon them ! 

I remember, when- as a student preparing for 
college, how with my tutor I took the night boat 

244 



A UNITED COUNTRY. 245 

from Philadelphia down the Delaware River to 
Baltimore. Then, by early train, we reached Wash- 
ington. I saw the morning set her crown of 
light upon the white dome of the capitol, in the 
great space fronting which the veterans of the 
Western armies were already gathering. These 
men had hewn their way with their swords down 
the Mississippi Valley, crossed Tennessee to At- 
lanta, marched eastward till they sniffed the salt air 
of Savannah, and then pressed northward till they 
joined their comrades of the Army of the Potomac. 
I remember how I was impressed while looking at 
Sherman, with his splendid staff of division officers, 
and in hearing them talk. 

I recall especially Custer, " the boy general with 
the golden locks," who led his regiments of cavalry 
which had, in every file, thirty horses breast to 
breast, nostril to nostril, and hoof to hoof, moving for- 
ward and keeping dressed with wonderful precision, 
while their riders in blue held the bridles in their 
left hand and their flashing sabres in the other. 
The young general, riding a fiery spotted mustang, 
wore a sombrero or wide-brimmed Western prairie 
hat that flared up in front, showing his broad white 
forehead. The column had turned to the right at 
the head of Fourteenth Street. A lady stepped 
out from the sidewalk with a large wreath of 
flowers, which she was about to put over the mus- 



246 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

tang's neck or the general's, — I could not tell which, 
— but this wild Western pony, unused to such atten- 
tions, leaped forward as if shot out of a cannon. 
The general's hat fell off, but he did not. Not even 
a buckins: or a rearino- broncho could disturb his 
firm seat. Yet unexpected and in advance of time, 
to the surprise of the presidential party who could 
not understand the reason, the hatless general 
reined up his horse firmly, bowed, and rode back. 
Soon his troopers were with him, and his hat was 
on for a profound bow to the President when next 
he appeared. On the field of battle Custer was 
accustomed to ride ahead of his men toward the 
foe, and, gallantly making his bow to those he was 
about to fight, to ride back to join his troops and 
lead their charge. To his own men the episode 
seemed a natural one. 

Glorious as the grand review at Washington was, 
the moral pageant was even more impressive. 
Within a few weeks the Union armies of the repub- 
lic, which had put over two millions of men into 
the field, were disbanded. The American soldiers 
both North and South handed back their muskets 
and equipments of war and went to their home 
and work. Confederate and Federal alike took 
up the tools of peaceful livelihood. As wonderfully 
as in fiction Roderick Dhu's band, or in mythology 
Cadmus's armed dragon 's-teeth warriors, the uni- 



A UNITED COUNTRY. 247 

formed hosts of armed men melted away. Noble is 
the record of almost absolute freedom from lawless- 
ness made by the men both of the blue and the 
gray. 

After a few years the Grand Army of the Re- 
public was formed of the veterans of the land and 
naval forces, and "posts" were established in most 
of the states, while the men of the gray uniform 
formed "camps." This was done for mutual friend- 
ship and assistance, for the joys of memory and the 
pleasures of oratory and feasting, and the inculca- 
tion of patriotism. It became the custom through- 
out the Union to decorate the graves of comrades 
with flowers. In time, all soldiers who had served 
their state or country in the field, and all sailors 
under the flag at sea of every war, were remembered. 
In later years Confederates and Federals marched 
together to make floral tribute to the brave. Thus 
the beautiful institution, the " American festival " 
of Decoration Day, now celebrated in all lands 
and on all seas, became fixed. 

All this, with the formation of various other 
patriotic fraternities, for women as well as men, 
gave a tremendous impulse to the study of 
American history and to the marking, by tablets 
and other monuments, of the historic sites and 
spots in our great cities, towns, and even in our 
villages. In churches and halls, and wherever men 



248 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

gather, the deeds of the brave are commemorated. 
The United States government began the laying out 
of national cemeteries for the care and in honor of 
those who died for their country. Near all the 
great battlefields, ample plots of ground were 
selected, planted with trees, beautiful flowers, and 
shrubbery, and made lovely and attractive with 
eloquent emblems. Over each burial plot the 
government has set a neat, plain monument, or 
markinof stone of white marble, with name, dates, 
military allocation, or has had chiselled the simple 
word " unknown." On the battlefields, the scars 
of which " nature has long since healed and recon- 
ciled to herself with the sweet oblivion of flowers," 
private munificence and national, state, or municipal 
enterprise have reared hundreds of memorials in art, 
making these once bloody fields gardens of beauty. 
Gradually the passions of the war cooled. Hatred 
and bitterness died out. The "march of years" 
meant also the march of a great host, who every 
year dropped out of the depleting ranks of the 
Grand Army, and were laid to rest. The men of 
the newer generation, none the less patriotic, faced 
fresh problems and questions. They were more 
and more willing to bury old issues and inheritances 
from the four years of strife. The veterans who 
had faced each other through rifts of battle-smoke, 
or at the Bloody Angle, made up first. 



A UNITED COUNTRY. 249 

I remember well being at the dinner, and present 
as a guest and speaker, given in Faneuil Hall, in 
Boston, where the Robert E. Lee Camp, of Rich- 
mond, and the John A. Andrew Post, of Boston, 
ate, drank, made speeches, embraced each other in 
friendship, " fought their battles o'er " in harmony, 
and pledged mutual \ows of loyalty to the Union. 
It seemed as if, from the canvas on the walls which 
had reechoed with the eloquence of Samuel Adams 
and Daniel Webster, the faces of the great states- 
men looked down in hearty approval. Orators 
and poets took up the theme of reconciliation. 
The sectional politicians and the parsons kept up 
the war still longer, while those that never did any 
of the real fighting were last of all to yearn for and 
seek the benison of the Prince of Peace, " Blessed 
are the peacemakers." 

In time the great war story was told in the bloom 
of art, the uprearing of monuments, the fascinations 
of literature and the drama, and in dispassionate 
narration. In the true perspective of history the 
men of the North and the South honor each other. 

Nothing exhibits the moral stamina of the Anglo- 
Saxon peoples more than their capacity to accept 
results, when the issue has been tried and the war 
is over — that is, when the other side has had its 
innings. General Robert E. Lee set a shining 
example. 



2 50 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

This war revealed also the possibilities of the men 
of African descent. Can their story be told better 
than is told on the memorial to Colonel Robert G. 
Shaw on Boston Common ? President Eliot, of 
Harvard University, who has written of " American 
Contributions to Civilization," thus puts a stout 
volume in a few words : — 

"The black rank and file volunteered when disaster clouded 
the Union cause ; served without pay for eighteen months, till 
given that of white troops : faced threatened enslavement if cap- 
tured ; were brave in action, patient under heavy and dangerous 
labors, and cheerful amid hardships and privations. 

" Together they gave to the nation and the world undying 
proof that Americans of African descent possess the pride, cour- 
age, and devotion of the patriot soldier. One hundred and 
eighty thousand such Americans enlisted under the Union flag 
in MDCCCLXIII-MDCCCLXV." 



CHAPTER XXV. 

AMERICAN MARINES AND SAILORS IN KOREA. 

OUT from the mainland of China rises the 
mountainous island of Formosa, or the Beau- 
tiful, so named by the Portuguese who were first 
struck with its attractive form, Japanese naviga- 
tors came here in old days, but so long ago that 
the history of their expeditions has become nurs- 
ery and fairy tales. Only in recent centuries have 
Chinese settled on the shores and plains, especially 
in the north, and not until 1683 did they take pos- 
session and assume the government of the island. 

The Formosan camphor trees are the most won- 
derful in the world. This is the land of the sky- 
blue bamboo. No island, perhaps, in all the earth 
is so rich in timber. In the mountains and on the 
east coast live the copper-colored, head-hunting 
aborigines. They belong to that great drift of 
humanity in the island world, from the Philippines 
to the Alaska peninsula, which extends in a circle 
and has furnished the ancestors of the North Amer- 
ican Indians. The more civilized Japanese, who 
are also relatives to these red men, and used to cut 

251 



2 52 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

off their enemy's beads after every battle, bave, in 
tbe orderly evolution of time, cbanged bead-hunting 
into a game of polo, in which red and white balls 
take tbe place of human skulls. 

The American bark Rover, whose captain bad 
also his family with him, was wrecked in south- 
eastern Formosa, and all on board were murdered. 
As the Chinese mandarins could do nothing. Ad- 
miral Bell, on June 13, 1867, landed a force of 
nearly two hundred marines and sailors from the 
war steamers Hartford and Wyoming. Our men 
plunged into the bamboo jungles to punish these 
savages, and perhaps cannibals. In the tangled 
thickets it was hardly possible to see more than a 
few feet ahead, and the red rascals knew the ground 
far better than the white stranQ;ers. It was so hot 
and so moist, so gloomy and twilight-like, that it 
was like fisfhtino^ a battle in a bathroom filled with 
steam. All that our men could do was to burn a 
few huts. Only occasionally did they catch sight 
of the flash of a gun barrel or see a puff of smoke. 
How many were slain on the Formosan side is not 
known, but one of our brave and gallant officers. 
Alexander Slidell MacKenzie, was killed. He was 
buried in the garden of the British consulate at 
Takao. When the funeral was over, one of the 
officers named Sigsbee, who was a good artist, made 
a sketch of the sad scene for MacKenzie's family 



AMERICAN MARINES AND SAILORS IN KOREA. 253 

and sent it to them. Sigsbee was afterward com- 
mander of the battleship Maine, destroyed in Ha- 
vana harbor in 1898. 

Although Korea still kept herself shut off from 
the world, thinking herself safe, her very isolation 
tempted marauders. Our American sailors ship- 
wrecked on her shores were fed and escorted over 
the frontier and delivered to the United States 
Consul at Newchwang in Manchuria. 

This was the seaport at which during the year 
1 894-1 895 the United States steamship Alert was 
fixed for the winter, lying inside of a sort of dry 
dock made by excavating the mud and surrounding 
her by earthwork fortification. Covered over with 
canvas, the ship served as a fort for the protection 
of American interests in that resfion durino; the 
Chinese and Japanese war. 

A German Jew, a French Catholic priest, and 
the renegade son of an American Protestant mis- 
sionary, with a lot of the riffraff of humanity, mostly 
Chinese, collected from the wharves of Shanghai, 
with some Manila men from the Philippines, made 
a raid into Korea in 1866. The American supplied 
the money, Feron, the French priest, was pilot, and 
Oppert, the Hebrew, commanded the motley expe- 
dition. Running their little steamer up a certain 
river at high tide, they marched overland. They 
expected, with coal shovels, to open the grave and 



254 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

dig up the bones of the Korean Regent's ancestors, 
in order to hold them to ransom. They would thus 
compel him to open the country to foreign trade. 

Instead of a plain grave, they found a granite 
mausoleum. Unable to make much impression on 
heavy masonry, and being pressed by the infuriated 
natives, they had to retreat. Thousands of angry 
Koreans gathered menacingly about them. After- 
ward, when landing on the island of Kangwa to 
steal sheep in order to get fresh mutton, they were 
fired upon, and a Manila man was wounded. This 
caused the Spanish Consul to begin an investiga- 
tion, which brought out the facts in the case. Yet 
no one was convicted or imprisoned. Is it any won- 
der that the Koreans did not at first take kindly to 
intercourse with Americans ? 

Another expedition of illegal entrance into Ko- 
rean waters, and therefore piratical, was made in 
this same year. Whether for lawful or unlawful 
purposes, is not known, for no one survived to tell 
the tale. In Ausfust the schooner General Sher- 
man went up" the Ping Yang River. The crew con- 
sisted of the owner, master, and mate, who were 
Americans, a Scottish missionary, who wished to 
learn the Korean language, and an Englishman with 
a Chinese money-counter, or expert, called a shroof, 
beside the pilot and force of Chinese working the 
craft. The cargo consisted of cotton cloth, glass. 



AMERICAN MARINES AND SAILORS IN KOREA. 255 

tin plate, and such other articles as the Koreans 
were likely to want. This was called " an experi- 
mental trading voyage," and may have been hon- 
estly so called. But when the Gejieral Sherman 
got into the river and near Ping Yang city, the 
Koreans, with fire rafts, bows and arrows, and match- 
locks, attacked and killed them all and then burned 
up the vessel. Years afterward a brave young offi- 
cer named John G. Bernadou, who in the Spanish 
war of 1898 commanded the Winslow, on which 
Ensign Bagley was killed and he himself wounded, 
went up into North Korea and investigated the 
affair of the General Sherman. 

Two of our ships — the Wachusett, Captain 
Febiger, and afterward the Ticojideroga, Commo- 
dore Shufeldt — were despatched to Korean waters ; 
but receivino^ little or no satisfaction it was thouQ^ht 
necessary, in 1870, to send out a squadron under 
Commodore John Rodgers, with our minister to 
China on board, to make a treaty ; or, if necessary, 
to chastise the Koreans. Soon there were assem- 
bled on the Chinese coast at Tientsin the follow- 
ing vessels of war: Colorado, Admiral Farragut's 
old flagship, and so handsome that it was called in 
the East by the French officers " La Belle Fre- 
gate^^ the corvette Alaska, and the smaller vessels 
Ashuelot and Monocacy. The latter was a double- 
ender, long and narrow, having a rudder at each 



256 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

extremity so that she could become stem or stern at 
will. By this time the British had begun to build 
ironclads, and our wooden vessels, although neat 
and trim, looked to the British and French officers 
very old-fashioned and antiquated. The Koreans, 
under the direction of the Regent, or Tai Wen Kun, 
built eight forts on the Han River, made bullet- 
proof cotton coats, and ironclad helmets of many 
thicknesses of cotton cloth, and prepared with the 
tiger hunters and other men used to spears, arrows, 
and firearms to resist the American invaders. 

The squadron arrived off Boisee Island, at the 
mouth of the Han River, on May 30. Twelve 
days later, the two lighter war steamers and the 
steam launches, under command of Captain Blake, 
moved up to survey. When our men had rounded 
the bend where the water ran in a narrow channel 
a hundred yards wide, making almost a whirlpool, 
they saw to their surprise a new earthwork, in 
which scores of small cannon were as numerous as 
if ranged on the floor of an arsenal. Only a few 
thirty-two pounders had been mounted in the 
embrasures ; but on heavy logs, nailed or lashed 
together in groups of five, were clumsy jingals or 
breech-loading cannon, like those used by Cortez 
and Pizarro hundreds of years before. In these, 
the iron breech could be taken out, filled with a 
cartridge, and then replaced and pinned down, los- 



AMERICAN MARINES AND SAILORS IN KOREA. 257 

ing much of the powder's force at the joint. In 
some of the rude guns was, not one touch-hole, but 
a row of vents to help the poor powder ignite more 
quickly. 

The Korean general had expected to open on the 
Americans just as they turned the rocky point and 
sink the whole line of steam launches, after the two 
steamers had forged ahead. The treacherous rascal 
was a moment too late in oivino- the sio^nal to fire. 
Our men w^re wet to the skin with the splash of 
the river, lashed by hundreds of missiles ; but only 
one American was wounded, and none of the boats 
was hurt. The little steam launches soon opened 
their bow guns, and the four brass howitzers began 
to play. The Palos and Moiwcacy, somewhat 
ahead of the launches, turned back and soon their 
ten-inch shells were dropping among the white- 
coated Koreans, who fled from the fort, leaving it 
empty and silent. 

Commodore Rodgers waited ten days for the 
Korean government, or local officers, to make apol- 
ogy for their treachery ; but no apology came. A 
landing force was therefore organized to attack and 
destroy the whole line of forts, seven in number, and 
built on the bluffs fronting the river. Twenty 
boats and four launches were to be tow^d by the 
Palos and Alonocacy. Ten companies of infantry, 
made up of 105 marines and 546 sailors, were to be 



258 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

put in command of Lieutenant Commander Win- 
field Scott Schley. The Monocacy had her bat- 
tery increased with two nine-inch guns from the 
Colorado. 

On the loth of June the chastising expedition 
moved up the Han River. The heavy guns of the 
Monocacy first breached the stone walls and then 
emptied the first fort with her shells. Our men 
landed at a point below the fort, and went into 
camp, after destroying everything destructible in- 
side the fort. The marines occupied a post in 
advance to guard against a rush from the Koreans, 
who, dressed in white, could be seen like ghosts 
moving about in the darkness and occasionally 
firing on our pickets. Under the stars our men lay 
down to rest before the day of toil and glory that 
awaited them on the morrow, which was Sunday. 

The next day the reveille was sounded and the 
men called to breakfast. After everything combus- 
tible in the fort, including the provisions of rice and 
dried fish, had been piled up and set on fire, the 
march began at seven o'clock, with the river on the 
right. The rough roads were only bridle paths 
through rice swamps and over hills. The marines 
led the advance, and the sailors dragged their Dahl- 
gren howitzers up hill and down dale. Coming to 
the middle line of intrenchments, the land force had 
only to wait while the good ship dropped her shells 



AMERICAX MARINES AXD SA/LOKS IN KOREA. 2.^C) 

inside the fort, which made the white-coats fly with- 
out firing their guns. It seems curious, but such 
is the fact, that in the Japanese invasion of Korea 
in 1592 the Koreans invented and used bombshells, 
which they called " Heaven-shaking thunder," and 
even built ironclad ships or tortoise-armored men- 
of-war to resist the Japanese. Now they had only 
matchlocks and jingals. 

Our men entered and tumbled the sixty brass can- 
non of two-inch bore over the cliffs into the river. 
Then under the hot sun they resumed the march 
in the steaming heat. The pioneers, sappers, and 
miners mended the road by cutting bushes, filling 
hollows, and widening the paths. 

Meanwhile the Koreans had gathered in large 
masses on the left, evidently hoping to get into the 
rear and make an attack with a rush, while our men 
were getting ready to storm .the main fort. To 
checkmate this move, a detachment of three com- 
panies with five howitzers were posted so as to 
guard the flank and rear of our main body. The 
sailors in two detachments had to be quick in get- 
ting the guns in position, — three on one hill and two 
on the other, — for the natives charged up the hill in 
the very teeth of the shells from the howitzers fired 
at both long and short range. Our artillerists used 
shrapnel, or bombs filled with bullets, which not 
only explode but drive each ball with a musket's 



260 THE ROMANCE OE CONQUEST. 

force. Coolly they took aim, and their fine practice 
saved the day. The Koreans were driven back and 
scattered. Often one exploding shell seemed to 
make twenty men first to leap into the air and then 
fall dead or wounded. 

The Monocacy out in the river moved abreast of 
our men, and threw bombs into the main fort on « 
the promontory, just eastward of the rocky point, 
from which the Koreans had fired on our boats 
on June i. The nine-inch shells pierced the walls 
and dropped into the forts, but the garrison bravely 
held their ground. The howitzers on the hilltops, 
now free, turned their muzzles and fired into the 
fort, over the heads of our men, who were resting 
in the cool ravine before charging up the hill. 
This citadel, the key to the whole line of fortifica- 
tions, was 150 feet high from the bottom of the 
glen. With the redoubt below it mounted 143 
guns. Our ship folk were to rush up the steep 
acclivity, which seemed more fitted for goats to 
climb and birds to fly over than for marines and 
sailors to scale. 

However, the Monocacy s shells had breached the 
walls, and through these openings our marines and 
blue-jackets could enter. Led by their officers, they 
dashed up the hill. The natives, knowing that 
death was sure, began to chant a patriotic song. 
Then, after emptying their jingals and matchlocks, 



AMERICAN MARINES AND SAILORS IN KOREA. 26 1 

they leaped on the parapet. Not being able to load 
quickly enough, they hurled stones at the assault- 
ing force, and even hurled dust into the eyes of 
the foreigners. Then with spear and sword they 
rushed at our officers, who were the first inside. 
The first American over the parapet was Lieu- 
tenant McKee, after whom one of the new torpedo 
boats has been named, and whose father was also 
killed in a breach during the Mexican war. McKee 
was shot and speared, but Commander Winfield 
Scott Schley, now admiral, rushed to support McKee, 
and was made a target by the same foe. The 
Korean who made the lunge missed his body, 
and the iron blade passed between chest and arm; 
so Schley was saved for Santiago. Immediately 
a carbine bullet stretched the Korean fiat. There 
was a terrible hand-to-hand conflict inside the fort 
between the men in white and in blue, but the 
Koreans not killed outright were chased outside in 
droves and shot as they ran down the hill. When 
the smoke cleared away, 243 corpses in white gar- 
ments were counted in and around the fort, and 
at least one hundred were drowned or floated as 
corpses on the river. Only twenty prisoners, all 
wounded, were taken alive. Two of our men were 
killed and ten wounded. 

After forty-eight hours on shore our naval peo- 
ple had captured five forts, fifty flags, and near!}- 



262 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

five hundred pieces of artillery, of which twenty- 
seven were heavy cannon, and the rest jingals. 
On Monday morning the whole force reembarked. 
The long line of boats towed by the Monocacy 
made a splendid sight. The flags — their staves 
tufted with pheasant feathers, and their canvas gay 
with bright paintings of flying serpents, winged 
tigers holding lightning in their claws, moun- 
tain gods riding on piebald ponies, mountains 
robed in thunder clouds, and other emblems 
of power — decorated the masts of the Monocacy. 
At half-past ten the victors rejoined their comrades 
at Boisee Island, the cheers of the welcoming sail- 
ors making the woodlands ring. On July 5, after 
a stay of thirty-five days in Korean waters. Admiral 
John Rodgers returned to Chifu, in China. 



CHAPTER XXVI. 

OUR EXPANDING EMPIRE ON THE PACIFIC. 

ON the Pacific, the greatest of oceans, the Amer- 
icans were, in their enterprise, far in advance 
of possession. Generations before they owned an 
acre of land on the Pacific coast, two ships from 
Boston — the Cohimbia,oi two hundred and twenty 
tons, and the sloop Washington, of ninety tons — 
had reached Nootka Sound, and passed the winter 
there. Captain Gray explored Queen Charlotte's 
Sound and the Strait of San Juan de Fuca, and 
having collected a cargo of furs, took them to 
Canton. He brought back a cargo of tea to Bos- 
ton, and, having rounded Capes Horn and Good 
Hope, his was thus the first American vessel to 
carry the flag around the world. 

Owing to the fact that the East India Company 
kept out British merchants from the Pacific trade, 
while Russian ships were not allowed in Chinese 
ports, very few vessels except those floating the 
stars and stripes were seen in the Pacific, or at 
least the northern half of it. Until 1814 the direct 
trade between China and all North and South 

263 



264 THE ROMANCE OE CONQUEST. 

America, and on both sides of the continent, was 
carried on by American ships. 

The Russians wished to keep our ships out of 
their Alaskan possessions, and they claimed the 
land and all the coast down to the Columbia River. 
Had the Russians been able to carry on their com- 
merce without our help, they would gladly have 
shut out our vessels; but they could not. In 1806 
the question was, for a time, settled by the Ameri- 
can ship Jiino coming in with provisions, and sav- 
ing the Russian garrison and settlers at Sitka from 
dying of starvation. 

The American eagle found himself between the 
two dif^culties of trying to please both the Russian 
bear and the British lion, for both nations claimed 
a large part of the western coast of North America. 
In 182 1 the Czar Alexander issued an ukase, de- 
claring that the water between the northwestern 
coast of America, from Behring Strait to Van- 
couver's Island, and the coast of Asia from East 
Cape, in Siberia, almost down to the island of Vezo, 
w^as a closed sea. In other words, the whole Pacific 
Ocean north of 45° 50' belonged to Russia. The 
autocrat of all the Russias said: "It is therefore 
prohibited to all foreign vessels, not only to land on 
the coasts and islands belonging to Russia, as stated 
above, but also to approach within less than one 
hundred Italian miles. The transgressor's vessel 



OUR EXPANDING EMPIRE ON THE PACIFIC. 265 

is subject to confiscation, along with the whole 
cargo." 

This was a pretty fair specimen of the kind of 
action likely to be expected from the autocrat who, 
when shown the plans of the Russian engineers 
for the making of a railway from Moscow to St. 
Petersburg, simply took a ruler and, drawing on the 
map a straight line between the two points, said, 
" Let that be the route." In spite of all the ex- 
pense involved, and the difficulties in the way, this 
became the route. But the United States never 
approved of monarchy, which means one-man 
power. 

At this time none of our people, so far as known 
at that time, could read Russian. Indeed, even 
as late as forty years ago, no English-speaking 
person could read a book written in Japanese or 
Korean. The accounts of the first explorers in 
the northern Pacific, being expressed in the Mus- 
covite's tongue, and not yet translated into Eng- 
lish, were unknown, and therefore the Czar's claims 
were mistrusted by our government. Mr. John 
Adams, after perusing all the books of travel and 
discovery in this region of the earth that he could 
get, found that the Russians' claims were not thor- 
oughly well grounded. He wrote in his diary, " I 
find proof enough to put down the Russian govern- 
ment ; but how shall we answer the Russian can- 



266 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

non ? " When Mr. Adams met the Czar's minister, 
Baron de Tuyl, who was a very agreeable gentle- 
man, he set forth very strongly what has since be- 
come the Monroe Doctrine. Perhaps this is the 
first clear expression of it in American history. 

Mr. Adams said, " I told him specially that we 
should contest the right of Russia to any territorial 
establishment on this continent; and that we should 
assume distinctly the principle that the American 
continents are no longer subjects for any new 
European colonial establishment." 

The Russian Baron was troubled because Com- 
modore Hull, of Old Ironsides fame, was going to 
take command of a Pacific squadron, and some of 
the toasts drunk at his farewell dinner seemed to 
be warlike in tone. It was feared there might 
be bloodshed between the Americans and the 
Russian cruisers. Happily for both countries, 
two good men were at work. A liberal treaty was 
made, in which the autocrat gave up his tremendous 
claim. The boundary line of Russian America was 
fixed at 54° 40'. Intoxicating liquors, firearms, 
weapons, powder, or munitions of war were forbid- 
den to be sold to the natives. It was evident that 
the Russian Emperor was entering into the spirit of 
the age, and wished to stand well in the world's pub- 
lic opinion. 

This dispute attracted much public attention. 



OUR EXPANDING EMPIRE ON THE PACIEIC. 26"] 

The British were glad that our country had become 
the leading power in arresting the expansive ambi- 
tion of Russia. Our own newspapers were full of 
lively paragraphs and squibs, which showed that the 
United States did not intend to submit quietly to 
the decrees of an autocrat. 

The Baltimore Chronicle of May lo, 1823, pub- 
lished this lively bit of doggerel : — 

" Old Neptune one morning was seen on the rocks, 
Shedding tears by the pailful, and tearing his locks ; 
He cried, ' a Land Lubber- has stole, on this day, 
Full four thousand miles of my ocean away ; 

"' He swallows the earth ' (he exclaims with emotion), 
' And then to quench appetite, slap goes the ocean ; 
Brother Jove must look out for his skies, let me tell ye, 
Or the Russian will bury them all in his belly.' " 

This treaty and the succeeding discussions at St. 
Petersburg deepened the old friendship between 
America and Russia. This had begun as far back 
as the time when William Penn and Czar Peter en- 
joyed a friendly talk on disarmament and the federa- 
tion of nations. It was increased by the action of 
Queen Catherine, who would hire no Russian mer- 
cenaries to help George III in his attempted subju- 
gation of Americans. It was continued when, in 
181 3, Dashkoff, the Russian minister at Washing- 
ton, offered, by direction of the Czar, that friend!) 






268 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

mediation which issued in the Treaty of Ghent. 
Commodore M. C. Perry visited Cronstadt in the 
United States ship Concord, taking John Randolph, 
our minister, there, and this time we had at least one 
American, Professor Jenks, who could talk Russian. 

Later on, Americans helped to build the Russian 
railways, even as they are doing now. When proud 
nobles, who looked down upon these gentlemen 
from Philadelphia, who had been educated, as Wash- 
ington had been, to be engineers, the white Czar, 
in the brilliant ball-room and before all the digni- 
taries of the empire, honored them by walking arm 
in arm with his guests from beyond the sea. After 
this our countrymen were honored by all. 

The two peoples became better acquainted with 
each other, and commerce increased. There was 
mutual sympathy when the Czar set free the serfs 
and President Lincoln emancipated the negro 
slaves. Again responsive chords were struck, 
when both liberators met death at the hands of the 
assassin, — one by the pistol of a fanatic and the 
other by the dynamite glass-bomb of an anarchist. 
During our Civil War, had Great Britain begun hos- 
tilities against us, a Russian fieet was ready in wait- 
ing in our waters to lend us assistance, and the 
Russians would have been our allies. 

The charter of the Russian-American company, 
which had a monopoly of the fur trade, was renewed 



OUR EXPAXDIA-G EMPIRE OX P/IE PACIFIC. 269 

in 1839. From this date until 1S59 British and 
American vessels were not allowed to trade in the 
ports of Russian America, and difficulties ar6se. 
Eight years later, all questions were settled by the 
treaty negotiated by Mr. Seward, and ratified by the 
Senate in special session March 30, 1867. For 
the sum of $7,200,000, all the Russian possessions 
in America were sold outright, without any incum- 
brance, and became part of the United States. 

Mr. Seward was a far-sighted patriot and one 
of the ablest in the long line of American diploma- 
tists. Like Washington, Jefferson, Jackson, Cass, 
Marcy, and other great statesmen of either party, 
Seward was a firm believer in the right and duty of 
national expansion. In his speech at Sitka, in 1869, 
he prophesied that, — 

" The Pacific Ocean, its shores, its islands, and 
the vast region beyond will become the chief theatre 
of events in the world's great hereafter." 

In 1852, in his eulogy of Henry Clay, he had 
said : — 

" We are rising to another and more sublime 
stage of national progress — that of expanding 
wealth and rapid territorial aggrandizement. 

" Our institutions throw a broad shadow across 
the St. Lawrence, and, stretching beyond the valley 
of Mexico, reach even to the plains of Central 
America; while the Sandwich Islands and the 



2/0 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

shores of China recognize their renovating influ- 
ence. Wherever that influence is felt, a desire for 
protection under those institutions is awakened. 

" Expansion seems to be regulated, not by any 
difficulties of resistance, but by the moderation 
* which results from our own internal constitution. 
No one knows how rapidly that restraint may give 
way. Who can tell how far or how fast it ought to 
yield ? Commerce has brought the ancient conti- 
nents near to us, and created necessities for new 
positions, — perhaps connections or colonies there, 
— and with the trade and friendship of the elder 
nations, their conflicts and collisions are brought 
to our doors and to our hearts. Our sympathy 
kindles, or indifference extinguishes, the fires of 
freedom in foreign lands. Before we shall be fully 
conscious that a change is going on in Europe, we 
ma)^ find ourselves once more divided by that eter- 
nal line of separation that leaves on the one side 
those of our citizens who obey the impulses of sym- 
pathy, while on the other are found those who 
submit only to the counsels of prudence. Even 
prudence will soon be required to decide whether 
distant regions, east and west, shall come under our 
own protection, or be left to aggrandize a rapidly 
spreading domain of hostile despotism." 

Out in the Pacific Ocean, nearly midway between 
America and Asia, though nearer to the United 



OUR EXPANDING EMPIRE ON THE PACIEIC. 2 "J I 

States, is a group of twelve islands. They form an 
archipelago, containing a land area of about seven 
thousand square miles, or nearly as large as»New 
Jersey. These islands have a lovely climate and 
fertile soil, and are rich in minerals. The whole 
group is volcanic, and some of them with the largest 
craters in the world are here still active. Beside 
forests and much timber, there are about two mill- 
ion acres of grazing land and two hundred and 
ninety thousand acres of arable soil, with plenty of 
streams flowing down from the mountains to the 
sea. The chief object of culture is the sugar-cane. 
On forty or fifty plantations about forty thousand 
tons of sugar are produced annually. Many other 
rich products are exported. Of the $35,000,000 
at which the sugar plantations were valued, about 
$25,000,000 were owned by Americans. 

The Hawaiian Islands were first discovered by 
a Spanish navigator in 1542. Captain Cook, the 
English explorer, made them better known by his 
visit in 1778, and by his death there in 1779. There 
had been long series of wars ; but the people had 
emerged from barbarism and a feudal system was in 
operation. In 1790 Kamehameha defeated another 
chief or king, and after several years of hard fight- 
ing became master of the archipelago. He was 
greatly assisted to get arms and supplies by the 
wealth which he gained in selling sandalwood to 



2/2 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

the American and Chinese merchants. By and by 
came a struggle between the progressives, who 
wished to overthrow the taboo system, which put so 
much power in the hands of the pagan priests, and 
those who held to old ways. After a bloody battle, 
lasting six hours, the conservatives were overthrown. 
Then bes^an the universal destruction of idols. 
When in 1820 the first missionaries, fourteen in 
number, — seven men with their wives, — arrived 
from the United States, the modern history of 
Hawaii began. The language was reduced to 
writing, and printing flourished. In 1S25 the Ten 
Commandments were adopted as the basis of the 
national laws. In 1840, Kamehameha III and 
the chiefs formed a constitution which gave civil 
rights to the people. 

Our first treaty was made with the Hawaiian 
government through Captain Catesby Ap Jones. 
Several attempts were made by British and French 
to seize the islands and hold them, but they were 
not permanently successful. Meanwhile American 
interests were increasing. Usually the native gov- 
ernment was carried on intelligently and peacefully, 
though there was a riot in 1874, which was put 
down by armed forces from the British and the 
United States war vessels lying at Honolulu. In 
1887 a progressive party demanded a new constitu- 
tion, which King Kalakaua accepted. Soon after 



OUR EXPANDING EMPIRE ON THE PACIFIC. 2/3 

this the king and queen and Lihuokalani visited 
Boston, wliere I had the pleasure of meeting and 
talking with both. When the king died, Lihuoka- 
lani succeeded to the throne as queen. She was 
thoroughly opposed to the new constitution. When 
after she had defied the will of the legislature in favor 
of the opium and baser interests, it was believed 
that she intended to proclaim a new constitution, 
restoring the royal power, a small but influential 
portion of the citizens rose against her and formed 
a provisional government. 

Our American minister at this time was the 
Hon. John L. Stevens. He was a pure patriot, a 
man of ability, and long diplomatic experience in 
South America and Scandinavia, and one of those 
accomplished envoys who have done our country 
honor abroad. He knew the situation well. He 
felt sure that if the baser element had any oppor- 
tunity, they would destroy foreign property and 
begin incendiarism. From the United States man- 
of-war Boston, then lying in the harbor at Honolulu, 
he ordered a party of marines and sailors to be 
landed for the protection of American life and 
property. 

The provisional government at once took steps to 
secure the favor of the United States. Each party, 
of the deposed queen and of the government, sent 
representatives to Washington. President Harri- 



274 ^'^^'^ ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

vSon warmly approved of the idea of annexation. A 
treaty making Hawaii part of the United States 
was sent to the Senate for ratification. For this 
the new Hawaiian government petitioned; but we 
had then no national policy on the subject. When 
President Cleveland came into power he withdrew 
the treaty, disapproved of the action of Mr. Stevens, 
and sent a "paramount" agent to Honolulu to 
secure neutrality. Nevertheless, on July 4, 1894, 
the republic of Hawaii was proclaimed, and Sanford 
B. Dole became President. With wisdom and abil- 
ity the Hawaiian republic was governed, until, in 
1898, it became an integral part of the United 
States. Then the action of John L. Stevens was 
vindicated. 



CHAPTER XXVII. 

OUR WAR WITH SPAIN. 

FOR centuries the people living on the seacoast 
lands of western Europe imagined that there 
was somewhere, out in the Atlantic Ocean, a group 
of islands which must be passed before the conti- 
nent, still further on, could be reached. The notion 
existed that during the invasion of the Moors, some 
Christian bishops and their flocks had fled to these 
islands and there found peace and prosperity. 
Gradually the legend took the form of islands ex- 
quisitely beautiful, and endlessly rich in gold, silver, 
pearls, and gems. These were the anti-insulse or 
Antilles, that is, the islands before you came to the 
continent. 

In 1492 Columbus discovered Cuba and other 
West India Islands, and later the American conti- 
nent was made known. So then, here were the 
Antilles — a name applied to all the islands in the 
Gulf and adjacent waters except the Bahamas. The 
Greater Antilles are Cuba, Hayti, Jamaica, and Porto 
Rico, with the islets clustered near them. The 
Lesser Antilles, or Windward Islands, form a cres- 
cent, with the convex side toward the east. 

275 



2/6 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

As Cuba was the first, so has it always been the 
chief colony of Spain. It was born into the world 
through volcanic action, and the Copper Mountains 
traverse its whole length, the highest summit being 
about 7750 feet high. Cuba is rich in almost every- 
thing that can satisfy the wants of man, and by 
which he can make money, such as sugar, molasses, 
rum, tobacco, coffee, fruit, wax, copper, metals, and 
minerals, the useful and precious woods, with al- 
most every sort of food, and pastures for great herds 
of cattle. 

AlthouQih the rivers are all small and not navi- 
gable, there are good harbors, with deep water, at 
Havana, Matanzas, Puerto Principe, Santiago de 
Cuba, and other places. Under good government 
this island ought to be the pearl of all on earth ; yet 
its history is one of human wretchedness. One 
contrasts it at once with another typical island, 
Java, of same size and with a similar climate, but 
Java has a much larger and happier population and 
vastly more wealth, while the government of its 
eleven millions is so good that little is heard of it. 
Java is happy to have had no history like that of 
Cuba. 

The first Spaniards who colonized Cuba, in 151 1, 
treated the natives so cruelly that in forty-two years 
the Indian population had become extinct. Cuba 
was the centre of the slave trade in Spanish Amer- 



OUR WAR WITH SPAIN. 2 7/ 

ica, and during the height of its activity, from 1 789 
to 1845, five hundred and fifty thousand slaves were 
brought into the island. The negroes rose up 
against their masters in 1 844-1 848, but their upris- 
ings were put down with awful slaughter, about ten 
thousand suffering death in 1848. The whole story 
of the island is one of turmoil and bad government. 

It was thought, even early in this century, that 
the United States must possess Cuba for the sake 
of self-defence. Our commerce was disturbed by 
misrule and periodical anarchy. Havana was the 
hotbed of yellow fever, which desolated our cities. 
The utter lack of drainage and sanitary system, 
with the accumulated filth in the Spanish towns, 
formed the soil for the growth of pestilence from 
which our country suffered. The vultures, nature's 
scavengers and living crucibles, abound in Spanish- 
American towns. 

During President Polk's administration a strong 
pressure was put upon our government, mainly from 
the South, to obtain " the Pearl of the Antilles." 
A hundred millions of dollars were offered for 
Cuba in 1848, but refused. In the insurrections 
which followed, the influence of American adven- 
turers was noticeable. When the revolution broke 
out in Spain, in 1868, the Cubans tried again to 
win their independence. War began, which lasted 
twelve years. During this time, in 1873, the 



2/8 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

steamer Virginius, with about fifty Americans on 
board to assist the Cuban insurgents, led by General 
Cespedes, was captured by the Spanish man-of-war 
Tornado. All of the volunteers were put to death, 
under circumstances of such wanton cruelty that 
the moral sense of the American people was out- 
raged, and it was felt that nothing similar would 
ever be allowed again. The losses and devastations 
on both sides were awful; but in 1880 the hopes of 
the patriots were blasted, for the Spaniards had 
crushed the uprising. Yet the island was left in 
disorder, and the public debt amounted to $85,- 
000,000. 

In 1895 a new insurrection broke out, and the 
Cuban republic was organized. Its flag, of blue 
and white stripes, had a white star set on a red 
triancjular orround. 

To put down this fresh uprising, and that in the 
Philippines which soon followed, Spain put forth 
all her resources, poured corps after corps, even to 
her full military strength, into the island. She sent 
her very best soldiers, and tens of thousands of her 
ablest young men, until her army in Cuba num- 
bered over a hundred thousand. The patriots 
could gather only a few hundred men at a time for 
skirmishes, ambuscades, dashing raids, or cavalry 
charges on detached bodies of the enemy. Yet 
the Spaniards died by the thousands. While bul- 



OUR WAR WITH SPAIN. 279 

lets and the machete killed hundreds, disease car- 
ried off tens of thousands. When Marshal Campos 
was recalled for lack of energy, General Weyler, 
who had been in the Philippines, was sent to Cuba. 
He was a soldier of the type of the Duke of Alva. 
He began war in an uncivilized and mediaeval way. 
Indeed, he reminded one of an Assyrian conqueror 
and the unspeakable brutality of war in early ages. 
His policy was to slaughter and burn wherever his 
soldiers could go. He compelled the paciiicos, or 
quiet people of the disturbed districts, to leave their 
homes and farms and to be reconcentrated upon 
reservations. There, without food or means of sup- 
port, they died of disease and starvation by the tens 
of thousands. 

Meanwhile, with our Cuban commerce ruined and 
the sufferings of the reconcentrados exciting sym- 
pathy and indignation throughout the United 
States, our government put pressure upon Spain 
to recognize the independence of Cuba. It had 
come to be a very costly matter for our government 
to keep watch, to prevent relief ships from sailing 
for Cuba, and to maintain neutrality, when so many 
thousands of our young men wanted to help the 
insurgents. The Spanish government recalled 
Weyler and sent Marshal Blanco. For a while a 
profession was made of giving the Cubans some- 
thing like self-government. 



28o THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

Meanwhile the insurgents of the PhiHppine Isl- 
ands were making progress against their oppressors. 
Even the Spanish army of twenty thousand men 
sent there could make little headway. Not know- 
ing what complications might ensue in the Far East, 
our government reenforced the Asiatic squadron. 
Our old wooden vessels, except the historic Monoc- 
acy, had been brought home. A fine new fleet of 
modern steel ships floated the American flag in the 
Pacific. On the 3d of January, 1898, Commodore 
George Dewey hoisted his pennant on board the 
flagship Olympia. 

When the wonderful year of 1898, so crowded 
with decisive and significant events all over the 
world, dawned, it showed that the Spaniards in 
Havana were resenting the American indignation 
against Spanish cruelties. The lives of Americans, 
and even of Consul General Lee (son of the great 
Confederate general), were threatened. The United 
States notified Spain that a ship of war, the Maine., 
would be sent on a friendly visit to Cuba. A recip- 
rocal courtesy was shown by the despatch of the 
Spanish armored cruiser Viscaya to the harbor of 
New York. During this vessel's stay in our waters, 
extraordinary precautions were taken by our na- 
tional, state, and municipal authorities to prevent 
any injury or hostile action by irresponsible persons. 
Meanwhile the American public opinion was still 



OUR WAR WITH SPAIN. 28 1 

further inflamed by two episodes. One was the 
exposure of a letter to a friend from the Spanish 
minister at Washington, in which he abused and 
slandered President McKinley. The other was a 
request from the Spanish government for the recall 
of Consul General Lee, which was refused. 

While all the elements of a volcanic explosion of 
public feeling were thus at hand, telegrams from 
Havana, on the night of February 15, 1898, sent a 
wave of horror and indignation over the country. 
It was like a great oceanic movement, almost 
certain to overwhelm all barriers and force war. 
The Maine was a second-class battle-ship in com- 
mand of Captain Sigsbee. On arriving, she was 
led and placed at her anchorage by Spanish officers 
of the port. About nine o'clock in the evening a 
terrible submarine eruption turned a magnificent 
ship into a mass of scrap metal, and blew 259 of her 
officers and crew into eternity. For four weeks 
the people waited for the verdict from the board of 
inquiry. A unanimous decision was reached on 
March 21, that the ship was destroyed by the ex- 
plosion of a submarine mine, or, in other words, 
as the people interpreted, by Spanish treachery. 

By this time the war fever had reached the boiling 
point. As our harbors were practically defence- 
less. Congress voted unanimously $50,000,000 for 
national defence. Immediately there began in 



282 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

the War and Navy Departments tremendous activ- 
ity. Competent agents vv^ere sent to Europe, and 
materials and ships were bought at home and 
abroad. Our harbors were mined, and most of the 
lights on the coast were extinguished. Property 
at watering places depreciated, and thousands of 
Americans, who had expected to spend their 
summer vacation in Europe, changed their plans. 
Every one saw that war was coming, and that this 
time our government would not allow the old state 
of things in Cuba to go on. President McKinley 
endeavored to avert war and advised the non-recog- 
nition of the so-called Cuban republic. General Lee 
remained in Havana till April lo, bravely super- 
intending the rem.oval of the American refugees. 

On the 1 8th of April, by joint resolution of 
Congress, war was declared, the President signing 
the document April 20. Yet our minister at Madrid, 
General Stuart L. Woodford, was not allowed to 
present the American ultimatum to Spain, for at 
seven o'clock on the morning of April 2 1 he re- 
ceived his passports from the Spanish minister. 
This constituted the actual beginning of war. 

President McKinley proclaimed the blockade of 
the coast of Cuba on April 21, and two days later 
issued a call for one hundred and twenty-five thou- 
sand volunteers. The regular army was concen- 
trated at Chickamauga, and soon our brave veterans 



OUR WAR WITH SPAIN. 283 

were " tenting on the old camp ground," amid the 
inspiring scenery and memories of the great battle 
in which General Thomas had won his title of " the 
Rock." At Tampa, a bustling city in Florida, where, 
over three centuries ago, the Spaniards landed with 
bloodhounds and manacles for enslaving the Ind- 
ians, a great camp was laid out for the concentra- 
tion and acclimatizing of our troops. 

Now, for the first time in American history, the 
United States, by act of the chief executive, gave 
up privateering as a relic of barbarism. In a clear 
and strong state paper President McKinley adhered 
to the Declaration of Paris, while Congress passed 
a bill to provide war revenue. Soon the stamps on 
bank checks, express receipts, business documents, 
telegrams, and various articles bought and sold, 
reminded one of the war days of 1861. Business 
went on as usual. Indeed, during this year, 1898, 
the volume of traffic, domestic and foreign, done, 
exceeded that of any year previously known ; yet 
the expenditures of the government were very 
great. 



CHAPTER XXVIII. 

THE AMERICAN FLAG IN THE PHILIPPINES. 

AGAIN, in 1898, as always in our history before, 
it was to be demonstrated that, opportunity 
given, the navy excels the army, for the one good rea- 
son that the navy consists of a body of trained pro- 
fessional men, who know their duties thoroughly, 
and is free from the withering influences of sectional 
and party politics. It is an ever ei^cient national 
arm of defence. On the other hand, in a great war, 
regular and amateur soldiers are mixed together, 
and the true army, unlike the navy, is not allowed 
to show what it can do by itself. The organization 
of the volunteer forces is honeycombed with favor- 
itism, partisan politics, and a thousand other influ- 
ences which destroy the efHciency of a noble body 
of men, whose energies are wasted, and whose aims 
are often defeated, by moral diseases from which the 
navy is free. 

The navy was instantly ready and efificient. Of 
the four ofhcers called to lead and strike at once, I 
had the pleasure of knowing three, their records 
and abilities and personal qualities. Having also 
a somewhat close acquaintance with the history and 

284 



THE AMERICAN FLAG IN THE PHILIPPINES. 285 

status of the navy, by examination of the records 
and acquaintance with the ships, I had no anxiety, 
from the first, for this branch of the service. I 
knew Captain Sampson as an expert in the theory 
and practice of modern naval artillery. He had 
long been in chief charge of the practice grounds at 
Indian Head. In the Naval Observatory at Wash- 
ington, where I first met him among the chronome- 
ters, micronometers, and all the delicate instruments 
for measuring time and space, he struck me as one 
of the most accomplished men I had ever seen. Not 
because his ordinary rank would entitle him, but be- 
cause of his consummate abilities, and to the great 
delight of the whole navy, he was chosen to command 
the fleet, which sailed April 22 from Key West to 
begin the blockade of the Cuban ports. 

Commodore Winfield Scott Schley was given com- 
mand of the Flying Squadron, which made rendez- 
vous at Hampton Roads in Chesapeake Bay. I 
had known him in Japan, and of his shining record 
in the Korean war, where he led the land expedi- 
tion which destroyed the Han forts in 1871. Bold, 
alert, and dashing, Schley waited for Admiral Cer- 
vera, who, with the armored cruisers Viscaya, Oquendo, 
Christobal Colon, Maria Teresa, and three torpedo- 
boat destroyers, made rendezvous at the Cape Verde 
Islands. For many days the whole American coast 
was in suspense. All asked "Whence.^ whither.'^ 



286 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

when?" but none could answer. Our swift cruisers, 
one of the best being the Cincinnati under Captain 
Chester, and many fast despatch boats, patrolled the 
coast from Eastport to Point Isabel. Yet nothing 
was heard of Cervera until he appeared off Marti- 
nique in the West Indies. 

It was wisely thought best to be thoroughly pre- 
pared for the whole Spanish fleet, and so word had 
been early sent to the captain of the battle-ship 
Oregon on the Pacific coast to come eastward. To 
make this journey round Cape Horn, would be a 
superb test of the quality, speed, and efficiency of 
American-built battle-ships. For years we had heard 
criticisms and objections about the foolishness of 
building a navy of the modern type. The objectors 
supposed that we had neither the workmen to plan 
and build, nor men to man and control modern 
battle-ships, and that such enterprise must be left to 
Great Britain because of her longer naval history, 
and whose admirals and sailors had more naval ex- 
perience. These were not the objections of Eu- 
ropeans, but of Americans. It was somewhat 
different from the idea of the young lady who, visit- 
ing a modern British man-of-war when the stars and 
stripes floated over wooden ships only, was told by 
the captain that in another war between Great 
Britain and the United States the former would 
surely win. Her only reply was "What, again?" 



THE AMERICAN FLAG IN THE PHILIPPINES. 287 

In sixty-eight days, at every moment ready for the 
enemy, the Oregon made her journey of fourteen 
thousand miles from Puget Sound to Key West, 
arriving without a screw loose or a bolt started, at 
Key West. 

Captain J. C. Watson was another officer who, 
when younger, had, like Schley, served under Far- 
ragut. I had known him in the waters of Japan, where 
he was in command of the Idaho at Yokohama. To 
me he impersonated the idea of discipline — whether 
against unjust superiors, mutinous crews or desert- 
ers, or fascinating ladies and gentlemen who for fun 
or pleasure would have relaxed the rules which are 
the very soul of the service. 

Another young officer, with whose record and 
abilities I was well acquainted, was Captain John 
Bernadou, who had shown great courage and cool- 
ness in Korea. 

While anxiety as to the whereabouts of Cervera's 
fleet was exercising the minds of our people, excit- 
ing news came by way of Spain from the other end 
of the earth. It was that Commodore Dewey had 
attacked the fleet under Admiral Montojo, and after 
sinking some ships had ceased operations to land 
his wounded. During several days of suspense, it 
was uncertain as to how far successful he had been. 

Soon the full story came in. The nation was 
thrilled with delight. Smiles broke out on every face. 



288 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

During a month or so, puns upon the Commodore's 
name were wrought, with various degrees of wit and 
vileness. Congress gave him thanks, made him an 
Admiral, and voted him a sword. 

On receiving orders to seek out and destroy the 
Spanish fleet, Admiral Dewey proceeded to Cavite 
Bay. At 5.41 a.m., on May i, the word from the 
Commodore was, " You may fire when you are 
ready, Captain Gridley." At once the battle began. 
Our ships made five courses, sinking or setting fire 
to three Spanish ships. At 7.35, Dewey's supply 
of ammunition having been heavily drawn on, and 
the effect of our fire on the Spaniards being uncer- 
tain, " the crews left their guns and went to break- 
fast." When this meal was over, the signal " close 
for action" was hoisted, and the work of destruction 
was continued, the whole Spanish fleet of fourteen 
war vessels being sunk or destroyed. Not a man 
on the American side was killed, and but seven 
were wounded. It was, what in ancient times 
would have been called, a miracle. 

This victory was the beginning of American ex- 
pansion and possessions in the Pacific, and of suc- 
cessful diplomacy with the Turks. Major-General 
Wesley Merritt was sent out with an army of about 
twelve thousand men. Under Generals Anderson 
and Greene, and with the aid of the insurgents, they 
invested the city of Manila. During the withdrawal 



THE AMERICAN EL AG IN TI/E PHILIPPINES. 289 

of Aguinaldo and his men, to celebrate some festi- 
val on the night of July 31, the Spaniards made an 
attack upon our lines, and for a while demoralized 
the volunteers, until the regulars came to their aid 
and drove the Spaniards back. At noon, on the 
afternoon of August 18, after an attack by sea and 
land, the city capitulated. Soon after this the Amer- 
ican force in Luzon numbered twenty thousand 
men. 

The Philippines are the gateway to China, and 
open the door to an enormous trade and a perma- 
nent market. On the way out from San Francisco, 
our officers took possession of the Ladrone Islands 
and hoisted the American flag. On the 7th of July, 
1S98, Congress, by joint resolution, annexed the 
republic of Hawaii. The ceremony was simply but 
impressively accomplished on the 12th of August. 
The action of our minister, John L. Stevens, in 
189 1, in raising the American flag and landing 
the marines at Honolulu, from the man-of-war Bos- 
ton, to protect American life and property, was thus 
vindicated. A commission of five statesmen was 
appointed to recommend to Congress such legis- 
lation concerning the Hawaiian Islands as they 
should deem necessary and proper. 



CHAPTER XXIX. 

SANTIAGO AND PORTO RICO. 

'T^O return to the Atlantic, Cervera compelled by 
^ need of water and provisions entered " without 
incident," as his telegram told, the harbor of Santi- 
ago at the eastern end of Cuba, where a long stretch 
of coast had been left unblockaded. The two squad- 
rons of Schley and Sampson now united off the 
entrance, and Cervera was "bottled up." Yet our 
navy could not follow into the harbor on account of 
submarine mines. Bombardment without much 
effect was made upon the forts on May 31, showing 
clearly that a land force would be necessary to take 
the city. The neck of Santiago harbor being like 
that of a bottle, a design was formed not only to put 
in a cork, but to wire it fast, so that the Spanish 
squadron could not get out. As storms might dis- 
perse our fleet and give Cervera an opportunity to 
slip out, Constructor R. P. Hobson with seven men 
volunteered to take in by night the steam collier 
Merrimac^ and sink her in the narrowest part of the 
channel and thus block it. In the face of the fire 
from the Spanish batteries, this was done on the 

290 



SANTIAGO A. YD PORTO RICO. 29 1 

night of June 3. Yet after all the enterprise was a 
moral, but not a material, success, for a well-aimed 
shot struck the rudder of the Merrimac, rendering it 
helpless. When the hulk was scuttled and sunk, 
there was room for the whole fleet to pass when 
Cervera should think best. Hobson and his men, 
captured or rescued, were kindly treated by the 
Spaniards. 

The commander of the army of fifteen thousand 
troops sent from Tampa to Santiago was Major- 
General W. R. Shafter. This officer having won 
a brilliant record during the Civil War, had also 
made a grand success of the army schools for the 
education of enlisted men. When it was objected 
that negroes would not, and could not, make good 
soldiers because they were illiterate, Shafter intro- 
duced schoolmasters. In four months, by constant 
drill and discipline, he had made his regiment 
of black men the crack organization of the army. 
Later he had the reputation of having a regiment 
fully up to the German standard of efficiency. 

A century and a half ago, the British army under 
Admiral Vernon landed at Guantanamo in Cuba. 
In this expedition Lawrence Washington and 
Jacob van Braam, the one the elder brother and 
the other the military instructor of George Wash- 
ington, served with the Virginia militia. In 1898 
our marines landed here and held the town and 



292 THE ROMAXCE OF COXQUEST. 

adjacent country. The Spanish sharpshooters ap- 
proached the post, while most of our men were 
enjoying a sea-bath. 

They had smokeless powder, and were covered 
with leaves and greenery, so that they could not 
be easily detected. Indeed, our marines who rushed 
to their euns had hard work to know what to shoot 
at, Throuijhout the war our men were at constant 
disadvantage, because they had only the old-fashioned 
black or brown powder, while that used in the 
Mauser rifle cartridges of the Spaniards made no 
smoke. It was often, very often, difficult on our 
side to find where the enemy was. In this affair 
Dr, Gibbs, the first officer lost in the war, was 
killed. 

On June 22 the army was disembarked at Dai- 
quiri, and by sunset of the next day, or rather the 
24th, the troops were all ashore. Our men began 
immediately marching forward. When our allies, 
" the army of the Cuban republic," appeared, there 
were detachments of tens, which, when all assembled, 
amounted to hundreds rather than thousands. 

On the road to Santiago, about three miles from 
Siboney, was a strong position called Las Guasimas, 
where the Spaniards lay waiting for the Americans. 
Young's brigrade and the dismounted volunteer 
cavalry, called the " Rough Riders," expecting no 
enemy near, were taken by surprise, and at first 



I 



SANTIAGO AND PORTO RICO. 293 

thrown into some disorder. Quickly recovering, 
they boldly charged and drove the enemy out of 
their position. Then our troops moved forward to 
attack the village of El Caney, but before this the 
hills and San Juan hills and blockhouses were to 
be carried. Sixteen light field-pieces, with infantry 
to support them, were sent forward. 

At six o'clock, on the morning of July i, the 
battle opened and soon became general. Though 
the Spaniards fought bravely and with obstinacy, 
they could not stand against the energy of our 
regulars. To complete their formation for a charge 
up the hill at San Juan, our men had to endure a 
very destructive fire. Then, after going a short 
distance, they found a great tangle-work made of 
barbed iron wire. Yet despite all obstacles, they 
drove the enemy from their position and held what 
they gained. 

As the Spanish general Tando was advancing 
with reenforcements of eight thousand men, it was 
necessary to continue the struggle next day and 
gain a decisive victory before the Spanish forces 
could be strengthened. On the morning of July 2 
the Spaniards began by a fierce assault, but while 
our forces under Kent and Wheeler drove back 
assaulting forces. General Lawton gained a com- 
manding position on the right, making victory the 
following day nearly certain. The fighting was 



294 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

renewed July 3, but the enemy soon gave way and 
the firing ceased. Our men had lost 230 killed and 
1284 wounded in the three days' fighting, and 79 
were missing. The Spaniards had lost 1500 men 
killed and wounded. 

As early as half-past eight General Shafter sent 
a flag of truce. He demanded of the Spanish com- 
mander the surrender of his army and of the city 
of Santiago. This was not acceded to, and yet 
there was evidence of a willingness to negotiate ; 
for while reenforcements for our army were on 
their way, the Spaniards had little hope of being 
reenforced. Furthermore, they had lost their fleet. 
On Sunday morning, July 3, Admiral Cervera, 
under orders from Captain-General Blanco, know- 
ing also that he would lose his ships when the city 
surrendered, and that while the channel was open 
he had a chance of success, moved out with his 
squadron of four Spanish armored cruisers and 
two torpedo boats, in single column. He then 
turned to the right, hoping, possibly, to destroy 
the United States steamship Brooklyn^ and to 
save some of his fleet. 

The Americans were not caught napping. Every- 
thing had been arranged and foreseen by Sampson, 
and Schley was ready. Signalling to all the ships 
to close and pursue, the most terrific naval cannon- 
ade known in modern time opened upon the Span- 



SANTIAGO AND PORTO RICO. 295 

ish ships. Within two hours after the opening 
gun seven thousand shot, weighing one thousand 
tons, had been fired, every Spanish ship was sunk, 
and six hundred men were killed or drowned, and 
nearly two thousand captured. On our side only 
one man was killed, and one wounded. This 
splendid triumph of the American navy practically 
ended the war. On July 17 the city and province 
of Santiago de Cuba, with over twenty-two thousand 
soldiers, was surrendered. 

It was the splendid qualities of the American 
private soldiers, especially of the regulars, that won 
at Santiago. It was the superb discipline and in- 
vincible power of the navy that destroyed the two 
Spanish fleets in the East and the West Indies. 

A very foolish controversy broke out in the news- 
papers concerning the relative merits, and the 
amount of praise and credit, due to Commodores 
Sampson and Schley, in the naval triumph at San- 
tiago. To tell the simple truth, both did their duty 
fully and nobly. In answer to words of congratu- 
lation from an old friend. Commodore Schley, as 
modest as gallant, wrote the following : — 

" Flagship Brooklyn, Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, 
July 31, 1898. 

" My DEAR Sir: — Thanks for your kind letter; 
I do not think that I deserve so much as has been 
said in my praise for the victory of July 3 ; I 



296 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

share its honors only with my brave comrades, and 
I have not forgotten that there is a God of battles, 
for he was surely on our side that day, blessed be 
his Holy Name ! 

Thanking you again for thinking of me, I am, 
Very sincerely yours, 

W. S. Schley. 

Rev. Wm. Elliot Griffis, Ithaca, N.Y." 

Porto Rico was easily taken through the military 
science and fine art of General Miles. The Span- 
iards expected that the Americans would land near 
San Juan, but the General directed the navy to 
shell the town of Ponce, while other war-ships were 
active near San Juan. On July 25 he disembarked 
his troops at Guanica near Ponce. In several 
spirited engagements the Spaniards were driven 
back with slight loss on our side. Already the 
larger part of the island was under our control and 
certain to be wholly taken, when the decisive com- 
bat, for which all preparations were made, should 
take place, when news arrived that the protocol of 
peace had been signed and hostilities were imme- 
diately suspended. 

Admiral Camara had sailed from Cadiz June 15, 
and passed through the Suez Canal with the sup- 
posed idea of going to Manila. As this move left 
the coast of Spain exposed, the Eastern Squadron, 



SANTIAGO AND PORTO RICO. 297 

under Commander J. C. Watson, was got in readi- 
ness to make a descent upon Spanish Europe in 
order to hasten peace. However, on July 26, the 
French ambassador in Washington, acting for the 
government at Madrid, made proposals to President 
McKinley for peace. The terms of our government 
being accepted, on August 9, the protocol was made 
and signed August 12. The peace commission met 
in Paris, October i, and the treaty of peace was 
signed December 10. 

Our country paid the expenses of repatriating 
the remnants of the Spanish army, out of which 
about eighty thousand had died in Cuba, mainly 
through disease. The evacuation proceeded during 
December, while in the Spanish cities held by our 
troops the work of civil government and reform, 
especially the cleaning of streets, the removal of 
dirt and filth, and the beginning of sanitary reform, 
proceeded. On the ist of January, 1899, the 
American flag was hoisted over the public build- 
ings in Havana, and Spanish rule in America, 
after four centuries of blight, was over. 

Porto Rico was definitely ceded to the United 
States. It was completely evacuated by October 1 7. 
The next day the flag of the United States rose in 
the air over the public buildings at San Juan. Our 
letters were henceforward directed to Porto Rico, 
U. S. A. October 18 is a red-letter day in the 



298 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

story of American expansion. On that date, in 
1867, Russia formally transferred Alaska to our 
flag. In 1804, on October 18, the Senate took up 
in executive session the treaty with France that 
added 1,200,000 square miles to our national 
domain. 



I 



CHAPTER XXX. 

THE GREATER UNITED STATES. 

WE pen the conclusion of our story of American 
Expansion on this day, April 12, 1899, when, 
war with Spain ended, the treaty documents duly 
attested and exchanged, and the President's procla- 
mation of peace issued, relations of friendship are 
resumed. 

Our countrymen have begun in earnest to grapple 
with their responsibilities in the West Indies. In 
Porto Rico, which is about half as larsj-e as New 
Jersey and one of the most thickly populated regions 
in the world, having nearly one million inhabitants, 
special attention has been given to the reform of 
popular education. The pioneers of our commer- 
cial, benevolent, and missionary societies are upon 
the ground. In point of privilege, and probably in 
general intelligence, the people of Porto Rico may 
soon be on a level with the average in the United 
States. 

In Cuba the transfer of authority was made Janu- 
ary I, 1899. The difference between the American 
and the Spanish regime is strikingly manifest in 

299 



300 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

government, sanitation, the general order that pre- 
vails, and the revival of business, though years will 
be required for removing the scars of war and the 
building up of the waste places. Beside our army 
of occupation, the police force of the cities has been 
reorganized on American models. The policy of 
the United States government is to employ as many 
as possible of the natives of the island of Cuba, and 
to so develop the island's resources and renovate 
the whole life of the people that the sincere pur- 
pose of our nation in delivering Cuba from her op- 
pressors may be manifest to the world. 

Beside Cuba and Porto Rico, the former coming 
under our control and the latter under our owner- 
ship by treaty, a number of smaller islands, reefs, 
and keys in the West Indies are under the Ameri- 
can flag and are bonded, that is, their ownership is 
declared in the United States Treasury. 

We turn now to the East. Surprised and electri- 
fied by the news of Dewey's victory over the Spanish 
fleet, our government despatched twenty thousand 
men to capture Manila and occupy the island of 
Luzon. To this work the stalwart sons of the North- 
west were especially called. San Francisco was 
made the rendezvous, and on May 13 the first 
regiment of volunteers, the 2d Oregon, arrived. 
General Wesley Merritt, born in New York City 
in 1836, and a veteran of the Civil War and in 



THE GREATER UNITED STATES. 30 1 

Indian campaigns, was put in command of the 
department of the Pacific. Before July 27, when 
he sailed with his staff, three expeditions had been 
despatched under Generals Anderson, Green, and 
McArthur, making in all about eleven thousand 
men, all of whom took part in the operations about 
Manila. The fourth expedition arrived after the 
city had fallen. 

The military situation with three sets of comba- 
tants was peculiar. The Spanish lines completely 
encircled the city and covered all avenues of ap- 
proach. Enclosing Manila and the Spanish forces 
again was the Filipino insurgent army of about 
twelve thousand men. Aguinaldo had proclaimed 
himself president of the Philippine Republic, had 
pressed the Spaniards back toward Manila, and had 
taken many thousands of Spanish prisoners, in- 
cluding four thousand men and officers. When, 
however, Aguinaldo, who had been profuse in his 
promises of assistance to the Americans against the 
Spaniards, protested against the landing of our sol- 
diers in places conquered or occupied by the insur- 
gents, all correspondence ended, for our government 
did not wish to recognize the insurgents as allies or 
bind themselves by any promises. 

In the night attack of July 21, that which usually 
happens during a battle in darkness took place. 
An enormous amount of ammunition was fired off 



302 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

without much result and with unnecessary blood- 
shed. On the American side ten men were killed 
and thirty-three wounded, and sixty thousand shots 
expended. On the other side about one hundred and 
twenty thousand Mauser cartridges were used up. 

On August 7 General Merritt and Admiral 
Dewey gave notice of an attack, and asked that all 
non-combatants be removed from the city. The 
surrender having been called for, the assault began 
on the 13th. The troops of Green and Mc Arthur 
turned the Spanish line of intrenchments and moved 
toward the walled city. Then a flag of truce showed 
willingness to surrender. In taking possession, our 
men had a double duty to perform. It was to gar- 
rison Manila and at the same time to keep out the 
insurgents, thus protecting the Spanish people and 
their property from loot or vengeance. This duty 
they did well, for all outrages were prevented. 

By March, 1899, the United States forces num- 
bered over twenty thousand men, most of whom 
were volunteers. Almost all of these, except the 
loth Pennsylvania, a Tennessee and a Kansas regi- 
ment, are northwestern men, mostly from Cali- 
fornia, Oregon, and Minnesota, and declared by 
General Merritt to be "of the finest material to be 
found anywhere in America." There was little dif- 
ference between regulars and volunteers, for the 
former were for the most part new troops, but the 



THE GREATER UNITED STATES. 303 

officers of both were not only instructed but experi- 
enced. The health of both soldiers and sailors has 
been excellent. " In the navy they have the advan- 
tage of living indoors and carrying their houses 
with them," so that sick men on the ships were 
almost as scarce as killed or wounded ; but the army 
was more exposed, the men on the picket line in 
the rice fields being often up to their middles in 
water. Provisions were good, and our men were 
well supplied. They took advantage of the pres- 
ence of the bamboo, which is a grass or cane end- 
lessly useful. With this they made cots or bedsteads 
raised above the ground, by which they escaped 
much discomfort and sickness. 

The Americans observed great deliberation before 
making any display in force, for it was hoped that 
Aguinaldo's army would disperse and the Filipinos 
submit to American rule ; but the ambition of Agui- 
naldo and his colleagues, who were mostly of good 
Filipino families, made peace impossible. They not 
only controlled the island of Luzon, but they sent 
detachments of their men into the other islands and 
compelled them to acknowledge the authority of 
the so-called Filipino republic. In that way they 
fomented opposition to the arms and government 
of the United States. 

Thirsting for vengeance upon the Spaniards and 
anxious for plunder, they made a treacherous attack 



304 THE ROMANCE OE CONQUEST. 

upon the United States troops, hoping to capture 
Manila, wreak their vengeance in bloodshed, and to 
appropriate the property of those who had suppressed 
them so long. Matters soon became strained. When 
hostilities were opened, the Filipinos were driven 
back, and our men, under General Elwell Otis, be- 
gan an advance which marked the beginning of a 
long series of victories. These will make a score 
or more of places, hitherto unknown to Americans, 
familiar on battle flags and in history. 

One special blessing to Manila is found in the 
waterworks, which w^ere the provision of a private 
benefactor and not of the Spanish colonial govern- 
ment. During the operations between February 5 
and 1 5 these were secured, thus securing an abun- 
dant water supply for the dry season. One after 
another the positions of the Filipinos were forced, 
until by the middle of April our army had occupied 
the region around Manila, including the line of rail- 
way, and had gained several advantageous points 
on several islands in the archipelago, such as Iloilo 
and other port cities, where trade has already begun. 
The typical method of American occupation was 
shown in the capture of Santa Cruz by General 
Lawton. He established his headquarters at the 
palace, a guard was at once placed in the church, and 
within an hour the city was thoroughly patrolled, 
to prevent looting. In every place entered by our 



1 



THE GREATER UNITED STATES. 305 

troops the natives were made to see that the Ameri- 
can flag always means law, order, and opportunity 
for improvement. 

Meanwhile, as fresh reenforcements are sent for- 
ward, there is presented beside the arrows of war 
the olive branch of peace, for the American eagle 
carries both. President McKinley had appointed 
and sent out in due season a commission headed 
by Jacob Gould Schurman, president of Cornell 
University. In a document of great clearness and 
simplicity, which was translated into Spanish and 
Tagal, the Filipinos were assured of the good pur- 
pose of the United States government to possess 
the whole archipelago, to heal the ravages of war, 
and to begin at once reform of abuses and the foun- 
dation of a new civilization in which peace, educa- 
tion, and opportunity for each man to enjoy fully 
the fruits of his labor should be within the reach 
of all. 

The facts that many of the regular troops in our 
country wished to join the regiments ordered to 
Luzon, and that not a few of the volunteers have 
signified their intention of returning to " the Dewey 
archipelago," and remaining there for business and 
a career, show that Americans have the true coloniz- 
ing spirit and, after a little experience, will equal the 
Dutch or English in ability and success. 

Since the opening of this century we have ob- 

X 



306 THE ROMANCE OF COX QUEST. 

tained from Spain, France, Mexico, and Russia 
nearly four-fifths of the area of the present United 
States, that is, 2,700,375 square miles, of the total 
3,501,000 of the United States before the war with 
Spain. We have had a century of experience in 
surveying, settling, developing, and governing large 
areas. Having had many nations within one nation, 
we have gained that long experience in dealing with 
large complex populations which forms the best 
warrant of our likelihood of ability to deal with the 
new populations in the Indies, both West and East. 
Providence directing us, and laying large responsi- 
bilities upon us, but not too much at one time, has 
timed the call to new work and duties. This great 
work of governing West Indian mixed races, Hawai- 
ians and Polynesians and Filipinos of varied ethnic 
stocks, has been given to us when we have been 
made measurably ready. The nation was never so 
completely solidified as at present, nor the Indians 
so quiet and easily managed as now. It is even 
probable that within a generation or two, having 
been fairly well civilized, they will be made citizens. 
The negroes have shown themselves responsive to 
opportunity. Some of the best regiments of our 
regulars are black. There is a still larger army of 
good teachers, preachers, business men, and skilled 
mechanics helping to fight ignorance and build up 
the country. In spite of occasional outbreaks, the 



THE GREATER UNITED STATES. 307 

success attained in governing the ignorant and tur- 
bulent European immigrants and the red and black 
people of our country, augurs well for our success 
in dealing with the Malays. There is little doubt 
but that the various new peoples, inhabiting the 
" Dewey archipelago," will respond to justice, kind- 
ness, and opportunity, even as the negro and the 
Indian have done. 

The new acquisitions to the United States terri- 
tory, whether as integral portions, colonies, or pro- 
tectorate dependencies, that is, Porto Rico, Cuba, 
Hawaii, the Philippines, and other islands in the 
Pacific Ocean, over which our flag floats, make a 
total of about 170,000 square miles, or an area about 
as large as California with Massachusetts and Con- 
necticut added on. This new population of from 
10,000,000 to 12,000,000 makes the number of souls 
under the American flag not far from 90,000,000. 

The whole trend of modern history seems to be 
toward colonization and protectorates of the more 
highly civilized among the less civilized nations ; 
or, in other words, the mastery of the living over 
the dying nations. Heretofore the pagan and half- 
civilized nations were controlled from within their 
own borders, but during the last three or four cen- 
turies the nations possessing Christian civilization 
have overflowed from Europe into other continents, 
so that now nearly 500,000,000 people, once gov- 



308 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

erned by themselves so far as they had any poUtical 
order, are under the control of Christian govern- 
ments. 

The steps in succession, as we have traced them 
in the " Romance of Discovery " and the " Romance 
of American Colonization," seem to have been, — the 
work of Prince Henry the navigator in exploring 
the coast of Africa and beyond, Columbus's dis- 
covery of America, the Spanish and Portuguese 
colonies in the New World and in Asia, the Dutch 
explorations and conquests, the entrance of England 
as a leading colonizing power upon the scene, the 
American Revolution, and the expansion of Great 
Britain, until now we see under her control 9,000,000 
square miles of the world's territory, and, besides 
nations that speak her tongue and look up to her 
as a mother, pupil nations in Asia and Africa by the 
score. We see Ang^lo-Saxon influence and ideas 
extending over the Dark Continent, in which a rail- 
way from the Mediterranean to the Cape of Good 
Hope is planned. Russia, dominating all northern 
Asia, owns 6,564,778, France 3,617,327, Germany 
1,020,070, and the Netherlands 782,803 square miles, 
while Spain, Portugal, and Denmark have the re- 
mainder of the 22,288,153 square miles brought 
under European influences during four centuries. 
Over 8,000,000 in the nineteenth century before 
1880, and nearly 9,000,000 square miles have been 



THE GREATER UNITED STATES. 309 

obtained between 1880 and 1898. Thus one-half 
the entire population of the globe is under the con- 
trol of European governments. Of the 52,000,000 
square miles of the whole world, over 22,000,000 
square miles are held in a colonial or protectorate 
form. It has been impossible for the United States 
not to follow the drift of history. From her little 
narrow strip between the Alleghanies and the sea, 
she has grown to her present vast proportions. 

This movement of the Aryan race seems to have 
been ordered by Him who bade Paul make his 
voyage from Asia, to introduce Christianity and de- 
mocracy in Europe, who sent the Pilgrims in the 
Mayflower to America, and who despatched the 
missionary ship Morning Star to the Pacific islands, 
carrying out the ideas and the idealism of that de- 
mocracy founded by Jesus, which is yet to fill the 
earth. 

Yet despite the willingness of the American peo- 
ple to fight when necessary, and of the American 
youth to turn soldier when his country calls, the 
genius of our people is peaceful. There is little 
fear of militarism getting a grip upon us. General 
Grant, our greatest soldier, was also our true cham- 
pion of peace, and successfully inaugurated arbi- 
tration on a large scale. President Arthur named 
our country the Great Pacific Power. President 
McKinley, accepting war only as the last resort, has 



3IO THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

shown himself a lover of peace more than of battle. 
At the Omaha Exposition in October, 1898, which 
was in itself a revelation of the rapid development 
of the trans-Mississippi region, he uttered the senti- 
ment of the nation, — " We must follow duty, even if 
desire opposes." He with thoughtful Americans 
sees that a new era has opened for this republic, 
with new opportunities, new duties, new responsibili- 
ties, and necessarily new principles of initiative and 
new methods of action. 

The triumphs of peace are greater than those of 
war. Though the clamor of the aggressively selfish 
is very noisy, yet the real heart of the American 
people is for peace. The conscience of the nation 
will urge our people to justice and generosity in 
dealing with the newer peoples under United States 
control. They will be willing to make sacrifices, 
in order to do for the islanders of the Pacific what 
they had done in times past for those within our 
own borders and beyond. American expansion is 
not one of territory only. 

The romance of conquest is not that of triumph 
over enemies only. In the long and glorious story, 
we have learned to conquer ourselves. Our truest 
victories have been over slavery, dishonesty, bad 
money, duelling, lynch law, violence, drunkenness, 
and the liquor power. Progress often seems slow, 
and there remains yet a vast domain, to be yet 



THE GREATER UNITED STATES. 311 

wholly subdued, of sectionalism, violence, cruelty, 
and lawlessness. We have much ignorance and 
illiteracy to conquer, sectionalism and race hatreds 
to overcome, and the long inheritance of European 
feudalism to overmaster. 

Nevertheless, with our material progress, moral 
reform has gone gloriously forward. As in national 
politics, the centrifugal forces of nullification and 
secession have been overcome, so in our day the 
centripetal or unifying forces have increased. By 
the solvent of the war with Spain, and in face of our 
new responsibilities, the sectionalisms of North and 
South, East and West, have been melted. The 
nation was never so strong in unity of spirit as 
to-day. 

Our inventions have conquered space and time. 
One can go from San Francisco to Manila seven 
times in the same period which Marcus Whitman 
required to reach Washington from Oregon. We 
have conquered pain and disease, and lengthened 
life. Armed by the science of medicine and in the 
armor of correct hygiene, the white man can live 
safely and even comfortably in the tropics. 

Our government has responded to the invitation 
of the Czar of Russia, who has proposed a congress 
of disarmament, which, if even partially carried out, 
may lead to the United States of Europe and the 
federation of the world — in both of which aims 



312 THE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. 

the Russian ruler was anticipated by William Penn, 
the founder of Pennsylvania, whose writings are 
to-day classics. The meeting is set for May i8, 
at the Hague, in the House in the Woods. Our 
American delegates are Ambassador Andrew D. 
White, one of the ablest American diplomatists, 
who has kept the peace with Germany; Seth Low, 
President of Columbia University; Captain William 
Crozier of the army, and Captain Alfred T. Mahan 
of the navy of the United States, and Stanford 
Newell, our minister to the Netherlands. 

In the light of our history, the words of President 
McKinley, at Omaha, seem less impulsive optimism 
than sure prophecy, — 

" The genius of the nation, its freedom, its wis- 
dom, its humanity, its courage, its justice, favored by 
Divine Providence, will make it equal to every task 
and the master of every emergency." 



4 



IF. A. Wilde Com/any, PtiblisJwrs. 



A 



RE VOL UTIONAR V MAID. A Story of the Mid- 
dle Period of the War for Independence. By Amy E. Blan- 
CHARD. 321 pp. Cloth, $1.50. 

The stirring times in and around New York following the pulling down of the statue 
of George the Third bv the famous " Liberty Boys," brings to the surface the patriotism 
of the young heroine of the story. This act of the New York patriots obliged Kitty 
De Witt to decide whether she would be a Tory or a Revolutionary maid, and a patriot 
good and true she became. Her many and various experiences are very interestingly 
pictured, making this a hapv->y companion book to " A Girl of '76." 

J 'HE GOLDEN TALLSMAN. By H. Phelps Whit- 
marsh. 300pp. Cloth, $1.50, 

The narrative is based upon the adventures of a young Persian noble, who, being 
forced to leave his own country, leads an army against the mysterious mountain kingdom 
of Kafifirias. Though defeated and taken prisoner by the enemy, the hero's talisman 
saves his life and, later, leads him into kingly favor. 

A valuable fund of information regarding the various plants, woods, and animals 
which furnish the world with perfume is happily interwoven into the story. 



w 



ILEAT AND HUCKLEBERRIES; Dr. North- 
inore's Daughters. By Charlotte M. Vaile. 336 pp. 
Cloth, $1.50. 

Mrs. Vaile has drawn the characters for her new book from the Middle West. But 
as the two girls spent their summer at their grandfather's in New England, a capital 
groundwork is furnished for giving the local color of both sections of the country. 
The story is bright and spirited and the two girls are sure to find their place among the 
favorite characters in fiction. All those who have read the Orcutt stories will welcome 
this new book by Mrs. Vaile. 



W 



'ITH PERR V ON LAKE ERIE. A Tale of i8 1 2. 
By James Otis. 307 pp. Cloth, $t. 50. 

The story carries the reader from March until October of 1813, being laid on Lake 
Erie, detailing the work of the gallant Perry, who at the time of his famous naval victory 
was but twenty-seven years of age. From the time the keels of the vessels which be- 
came famous were laid until the victory was won which made Perry's name imperish- 
able, the reader is kept in close touch with all that concerned Perry, and not only the 
main facts but the minor details of the story are historically correct. 

Just the kind of historical story that young people — boys especially —are intensely 
interested in. 



B 



ARBARA'S HERITAGE ; or, Young Americans 

Avioiig the Old Italian Masters. By D. L. Hoyt. 325 pp. 
Cloth, $1.50. 

We welcome a book from the pen of Miss Hoyt, whose foreign travel and study 
has made possible an exceedingly interesting story, into which has been interwoven 
much instructive and valuable information. 

With a desire to broaden the education of her son and daughter by the opportunities 
afforded in foreign travel, an American mother takes them to Italy, and the author in a 
very happy strain has given us their many experiences Replete with numerou"^ 'llus- 
trations and half-tones, it makes a handsome and attractive volume. 

W, A. Wilde Company., Boston and Chicago. 



JV. A. Wilde Company, Publishers, 



Cr-HE QUEEN'S RANGERS. By Charles Led yard 
J. Norton. 352 pp. Cloth, $1,50. 

The thrilling period during the last years of our struggle for independence forms the 
groundwork for Colonel Norton's latest work. 

The intense patriotism which prompted our young men to do and dare anything for 
their country is shown in the exploits of the three young heroes. 

By enlisting for a time beneath His Majesty's flag ihey were able to give much valu- 
able information to the colonial cause. 

With historical truth the author in this, his latest book, has happily coupled an ex- 
ceedingly interesting and instructive story. 

r'HE ROMANCE OF CONQUEST. The Story of 
American Expansion through Arms and Diplomacy. By Wil- 
liam E. Griffis. 312 pp. Cloth, $1.50. 

In concise form it is the story of American expansion from the birth of the nation to 
the present day. 

The reader will find details of every war. Anecdote enlivens the story from July 4, 
1776, down to the days of Dewey, Sampson, and Schley, and of Miles, Merritt, Shaffer, 
and Otis. It is a book as full of rapid movement as a novel. 

TJ/HEN BOSTON BRAVED THE KING. A Story 
rr of Tea-Party Times. Bv W. E. Barton, D. D. 314 pp. 
Cloth, $1.50. 

One of the most absorbing stories ot the Colonial-Revolutionary period published. 
The author is perfectly at home with his subject, and the story will be one of the popu- 
lar books of the year. 

" Though largely a story of boys and for boys, it has the liveliest interest for all 
classes of readers, and makes a strong addition to Dr. Barton's already notable series 
of historical tales." — Christian Endeavor H'orld. 

" It is a pleasure to read and to recommend such a book as this. In fact, we must 
say at the very beginning, that Dr. Barton is becoming one of the most skilful and enjoy- 
able of American story-tellers." — Bostonjournal. 

f^A DE T STAND ISH OF THE ST. LO UIS. A Story 
v> of Our Naval Campaign in Cuban Waters. By William 
Drysdale. 352 pp. Cloth, $1.50. 

A strong, stirring story of brave deeds bravely done. A vivid picture of one of the 
most interesting and eventful periods of the late Spanish War. 

" It is what the boys are likely to call ' a rattling good story.' " — Cleveland Plain 
Dealer. 

" Mr. Drysdale has drawn an effective picture of the recent war with Spain in his new 
book. The story is full of dash andfire without being too sensational." — Congre- 
gaiionalist. 



1 



J 



DA UGHTER OF THE WEST. The Story of an 
American Princess. By Evelyn Raymond. 347 pp. Cloth, 

I1.50. 

Interesting, wholesome, and admirable in every way is Mrs. Raymond's latest story 
for girls. Descriptions of California life are one of the fascinations of the book. 

" A well-written story of Western life and adventure, which has for its heroine a 
brave, high-minded girl." — Chronicle Telegraph, Pittsburg. 

" Laid among the broad valleys and lofty mountains of California every chapter is 
crowded full of most interesting experiences." — Christian Ettdeavor World. 

JV. A. Wilde Company, Boston and Chicago. 



IV. A. Wilde Com /'any. Publishers. 



War of the Revolution Series. 

By Everett T. Tomlinson. 



r 



r 



'HREE COLONIAL BOYS. A Story of the Times 
of '76. 368 pp. Cloth, $1.50. 

It is a story of three boys who were drawn into the events of the times, is patriotic, 
exciting, clean, and healthful, and instructs without appearing to. The heroes are 
manly boys, and no objectionable language or character is introduced. The lessons of 
courage and patriotism especially will be appreciated in this day. — Boston Transcript. 

'HREE YOUNG CONTINENTALS. A Story of 
the American Revolution. 364 pp. Cloth, $1.50. 

This story is historically true. It is the best kind of a story either for boys or girls, 
and is an attractive method of teaching history. — Jourtial 0/ Ediication, Boston. 

TITASHINGTON S YOUNG AIDS. A Story of the 
rr New Jersey Campaign, 1776-1777. 391 pp. Cloth, $1.50. 

The book has enough history and description to give value to the story which ought 
to captivate enterprising boys. — Quarterly Book Review. 

The historical details of the story are taken from old records. These include 
accounts of the life on the prison ships and prison houses of New York, the raids of the 
pine robbers, the tempting of the Hessians, the end of Fagan and his band, etc. — 
Publisher'' s Weekly. 

Few boys' stories of this class show so close a study of history combined with such 
genial story-telling power. — The Outlook. 

rWO YOUNG PATRIOTS. A Story of Burgoyne's 
Invasion. 366 pp. Cloth, $1.50. 

The crucial campaign in the American struggle for independence came in the sum- 
mer of 1777, when Gen. John Burgoyne marched from Canada to cut the rebellious 
colonies asunder and join another British army whicli was to proceed up the valley of 
the Hudson. The American forces were brave, hard fighters, and they worried and 
harassed the British and finally defeated them. The history of this campaign is one 
of great interest and is well brought out in the part which the " two young patriots" 
took in the events which led up to the surrender of General Burgoyne and his army. 

The set of four volumes in a box, $6.00. 



OUCCESS. By Orison Swett Marden. Author of 

O " Pushing to the Front," " Architects of Fate," etc. 317 pp. 
Cloth, $1.25. 

It is doubtful whether any success books for the young have appeared in modern 
times which are so thoroughly packed from lid to lid with stimulating, uplifting, and in- 
spiring material as the self-help books written by Orison Swett Marden. There is not a 
dry paragraph nor a single line of useless moralizing in any of his books. 

To stimulate, inspire, and guide is the mission of his latest book, " Success," and 
helpfulness is its keynote. Its object is to spur the perplexed youth to act the Columbus 
to his own undiscovered possibilities ; to urge him not to wait for great opportunities, 
but to seize common occasions and make them great, for he cannot tell when fate may 
take his measure for a higher place. 

fV. A, Wilde Company, Boston and Chicago. 



JF. A. IV/'hie Company, rtihlishers. 



Brain and Brawn Series. 

By William Drysdale. 

r'HE YOUNG REPORTER. A Story of Printing 
House Square. 300 pp. Cloth, $1.50. 

I commend the book unreservedly. — Golden Rule. 

" The Young Reporter " is a rattling book for boys. — New York Recorder . 

The best boys' book I ever read. — I\/r. Phillips., Critic/or Ne7v York Times. 

r'HE EAST MAIL. A Story of a Train Boy. 328 pp. 
Cloth, $1.50. 

" The Fast Mail " is one of the very best American books for boys brought out this 
season. Perliaps there could be no better contirmation of this assertion than the fact 
that the little sons of the present writer have greedily devoured the contents of the vol- 
ume, and are anxious to know how soon they are to get a sequel. — The Art Amateur, 
Nevi York. 

CTTIE BEACH PATROL. A Story of the Life-Saving 
-/ Service. 318 pp. Cloth, #1.50. 

The style of narrative is excellent, the lesson inculcate^ of the best, and, above all, 
the boys and girls are real. — Ne7v York Times. 

A book of adventure and daring, which should delight as well as stimulate to Iflgher 
ideals of life every boy who is so happy as to possess it. — Examiner. 

It is a strong book for boys and young men. — Buffalo Commercial. 

rHE YOUNG SUPERCARGO. A Story of the 
Merchant Marine. 352 pp. Cloth, I1.50. 

Kit Silburn is a real " Brain and Brawn "' boy, full of sense and grit and sound 
good qualitie.s. Determined to make his way in life, and with no influential friends to 
give him a start, he does a deal of hard work between the evening when he first meets 
the stanch Captain Griffith, ' and the proud day w hen he becomes purser of a great 
ocean steamship. His sea adventures are mostly on shore; but whether he is cleaning 
the cabin of the North Cape, or landing cargo in Yucatan, or hurrying the spongers 
and fruitmen of Nassau, or exploring London, or sight seeing with a disguised prince 
in Marseilles, he is always the same busy, thoroughgoing, manly Kit. Whether or not 
he has a father alive is a question of deep interest throughout the story ; but that he 
has a loving and loyal sister is plain from the start. 

The set of four volumes in a box, $6.00. 



CiERAPH, TILE LLTTLE VLOLLNLSTE. By Mrs. 
O C, V. Jamieson. 300 pp. Cloth, |i. 50. 

The scene of the story is the French quarter of New Orleans, and charming bits of 
local color add to its attractiveness. — The Boston Journal. 

Perhaps the most charming story she has ever written is that which describes Seraph, 
the little violiniste. — Transcript, Boston. 

IV. A. Wilde Company, Boston and Chicago, 



IV. A. Wilde Compauv, Pjthliskers. 



I 



TraveI=Adventure Series. 

'N WILD AFRICA. Adventures of Two Boys in the 
Sahara Desert, etc. Bv Thos. W. Knox. 325 pp. Cloth, $1.50. 
A story of absorbing interest. — Bosioti Journal. 

Our young people will pronounce it unusually good. — Albany Argus. 
Col. Knox has struck a popular note in his latest volume. — Springfield Republican. 

rHE LAND OF THE KANGAROO. By Thos. 
W. Knox. Adventures of Two Boys in the Great Island Con- 
tinent. 318 pp. Cloth, $1.50. 

His descriptions of the natural history and botany of the country are very interest- 
ing. — Detroit Free Press. 

The actual truthfulness of the book needs no gloss to add to its absorbing interest. — 
The Book Buyer, New York. 

r\VER THE ANDES ; or. Our Boys in New South 
L/ Avierica. By Hezekiah Butterworth, 368 pp. Cloth, 

$1.50. 

No viriter of the present century has done more and better service than Hezekiah 
Butterworth in the production of helpful literature for the young. In this volume he 
writes, in his own fascinating way, of a country too little known by American readers.— 
Christian Work. 

Mr. Butterworth is careful of his historic facts, and then he charmingly interweaves 
his quaint stories, legends, and patriotic adventures as few writers can. — Chicago Inter- 
Ocean 

The subject is an inspiring one, and Mr. Butterworth has done full justice to the 
high ideals which have inspired the men of South America. — Religious Telescope. 

OST IN NICARAGUA ; or. The Lands of the Great 
Canal. By Hezekiah Butterworth. 295 pp. Cloth, I1.50. 

The book pictures the wonderful land of Nicaragua and continues the story of the 
travelers whose adventures in South America are related in " Over the Andes." In this 
companion book to " Over the Andes," one of the boy travelers who goes into the 
Nicaraguan forests in search of a quetzal, or the royal bird of the Aztecs, falls into an 
ancient idol cave, and is rescued in a remarkable way by an old Mosquito Indian. The 
narrative is told in such a way as to give the ancient legends of Guatemala, the story of 
the chieftain, Nicaragua, the history of the Central American Republics, and the natural 
history of the wonderlands of the ocelot, the conger, parrots, and monkeys. 

Since the voyage of the Oregon, of 13,000 miles to reach Key West the American 
people have seen what would be the value of the Nicaragua Canal. The book gives the 
history of the projects for the canal, and facts about Central America, and a part of it 
was written in Costa Rica. It enters a new field. 

The set of four volumes in a box, $6.00. 



L 



^ 



UARTERDECK AND FOK'SLE. By Molly 
Elliott Seawell. 272 pp. Cloth, $1.25. 

Miss Seawell has done a notable work for the young people of our country in ner 
excellent stories of naval exploits. They are of the kind that causes the reader, no 
matter whether young or old, to thrill with pride and patriotism at the deeds of daring 
of the heroes of our navy. 

W. A. Wildd Cotnpatiy.^ Boston and Chicago, 



IV. A. Wilde Covtpaity, Publishers. 



Fighting for the Flag Series. 

By Chas. Ledyard Norton. 



J 



'ACK BENSON'S LOG; or, Afloat 7vith the Flag in 
'6i. 281pp. Cloth, $1.25. 

An unusually interesting historical story, and one that will arouse the loyal impulses 
of every American boy and girl. The story is distinctly superior to anything ever 
attempted along this line before. — The Independent. 

A story that will arouse the loyal impulses of every American boy and girl. — The 
Press. 



A 



MEDAL OF HONOR MAN; or. Cruising A?nong 
Blockade Runners. 280 pp. Cloth, $1,25. 

A bright, breezv sequel to " Jack Benson's Log." The book has unusual literary 
excellence. — The Book Buyer, New York. 

A stirring story for boys. — The Journal, Indianapolis. 

lyriDSHIPMAN JACK. 290 pp. Cloth, $1.25. 

-^ '-•• Jack is a delightful hero, and the author has made his experiences and ad- 
ventures seem very real. — Congregatiotialist . 

It is true historically and full of exciting war scenes and adventures. — Outlook. 

A stirring story of naval service in the Confedei-ate waters during the late war. — 
Presbyterian. 

The set of three volumes in a box, $3.75. 



J 



GIRL OF 'yd. By Amy E. Blanchard. 331 pp. 

Cloth, $1.50. 

" A Girl of '76" lays its scene in and around Boston where the principal events of 
the early period of the Revolution were enacted. Elizabeth Hall, the heroine, is the 
daughter of a patriot who is active in the defense of his country. The story opens with 
a scene in Charlestnwn, where Elizabeth Hall and her parents live. The emptying of 
the tea in Boston Harbor is the means of giving the little girl her first strong impression 
as to the seriousness of her father's opinions, and causes a quarrel between herself and 
her schoolmate and playfellow, Amos Dwight. 



J 



SOLDIER OF TILE LEGION. By Chas. Led- 
yard Norton. 300 pp. Cloth, ^1.50. 

Two boys, a Carolinian and a Virginian, born a few years apart during the last half 
of the eighteenth century, afford the groundwork for the incidents of this tale. 

The younger of the two was William Henry Harrison, sometime President of the 
United States, and the elder, his companion and faithful attendant through life, was 
Carolinus Bassett, Serjeant of the old First Infantry, and in an irregular sort of a way 
Captain of Virginian Horse. He it is who tells the story a few years after President 
Harrison's death, his granddaughter acting as critic and amanuensis. 

The story has to do with the early days of the Republic, when the great, wild, un- 
known West was beset by dangers on every hand, and the Government at Washington 
was at its wits' end to provide ways and means to meet the perplexing problems of 
national existence. 

W. A. Wilde Company .^ Boston and Chicago. 



A. Wilde Covipanv, riil>lishers. 



CT-HE ORCUTT GIRLS; or, One Term at the Academy 
J. By Charlotte M. Vaile. 3,6 pp. Cloth, $1.50 ^' 

adventures are des'cribed in an enterta?fi;,„';.':iT^trr^^^^^^ ^"'' ^"'^ "^^•■■ 
phas'Jrf N:wVn'g?a^nd":duca.i7nalllt:;^'th^}.^ l^^r \"'°"^ - ^ description of a 
with an exception here and there"-S« Ti^anscr^t °"' ' """^ °^ "'^ P^^*' 

QUE ORCUTT A Sequel to " The Orcutt Girls." By 
iJ Charlotte M. Vaile. 330 pp. Cloth, ^1.50. 

sty.Jl.;Lh%hrrar,fzefth^e berstSrfur°be'sttAte'rr ^^f" ^" ^^li^-l^ «°-"^ 
as ^S^-^^^^^~Si^ =n a .a. 

^^^ M. MCA Story of the Great Rockies. By 

J. Charlotte M. Vaile. 232 pp. Cloth, $r.. 5 

holdT^,?^:'^^:;:^^!;^^;^: -:i^JSr^h/S1^^hLl;?::^/tlf- circumstances, to 
in other ventures, is well brouRlTt out. Tlie Iwt rP=T=H u^!', y^"?'^ "^ misfortune 
'Old Hopefull's" niclcname a liollow mockery stil fol oweThfr^ i"h'' "'^'^'^ '^=*' "^'^^ 
almost within his grasp. The little school tearLrwJfV, ''''^", ^ fortune was 

Hopefull's " expeinc-e, and the'S,t Ire^X^'st^tT^^YCritlsSV;" " ^''^ 

T'^fJ''f^^F^,OEI?ISCOFERV; or, a Thousand 

influL'e^^wtti^ia^^te^fl-atoV'or^^lret^^^^^^ ^^T^iLl^X'^/'^ ^f ""^ ^^ 
An .nlensely interesting narrative followiifg wdUautCSfd hts^C"^^^^^^^ . 



T^Tmi^^'^^'^^ ^^ AMERICAN COLONIZA- 

a xkt' '"'' Vf" *''' ^'"'"^'^i^ons of Our Country Were Laid 
By William Elliot Gr.ffis. 295 pp. Cloth, |r. 50 

andir rivaf S^adrn^-fhireTaTn' 'xT^l\ distinct streams of humanity 
Portugese and French also and th^ n,I.» n ' ^"'^ typified by the Spanish, with 

by .h^Engibh .nri!±rAV£mt oe?r,rrdij^i;i;fc5pr' "" "" '"""" 

A ^P'^, ^^ '^"^ REVOLUTION. An Historical 

f sISjS;» "'Bait ivT ^-f • - ""-'^"' 

tl>at figure in it are Preside'" Jefferson Cen An^ ""t'^T"' ^^">°ng the characters 
and many other prominentlovefn^^^id^rm^'officiaYs^''''"' ^""^■'^'^ Wilk.nson, 

W. A. Wilde Company^ Boston and Chicago. 



IV. A. Wilde Conpaiiy, Publishers. 



M 



A 



ALVERN, A NEIGHBORHOOD STORY. By 
Ellen Douglas Deland. 341 pp. Cloth, $1.50. 

Her descriptions of boys and girls are so true, and her knowledge of their ways is 
so accurate, that one must feel an admiration for her complete mastery of her chosen 
field. — The A rgus, A Ibany. 

Miss Deland was accorded a place with Louisa M. Alcott and Nora Perry as a 
successful writer of books for girls. We think this praise none too high. — The Post. 

SUCCESSFUL VENTURE. By Ellen Douglas 
Deland. 340 pp. Cloth, $1.50. 

One of the many successful books that have come from her pen, which is certainly 
the very best. — Bostofi Herald. 

It is a good piece of work and its blending of good sense and entertainment will be 
appreciated. — Congregatiofiatist . 

ATRINA. By Ellen Douglas Deland. 340 pp. 
Cloth, $1.50. 

" Katrina " is the story of a girl who was brought up by an aunt in a remote village 
of Vermont. Her life is somewhat lonely until a family from New York come there to 
board during the summer. Katrma's aunt, who is a reserved woman, has told her little 
of her antecedents, and she supposes that she has no other relatives. Her New York 
friends grow very fond of her and finally persuade her to visit them during the winter. 
There new pleasures and new temptations present themselves, and Katrina's character 
develops through them to new strength. 

BOVE THE RANGE. By Theodora R." Jenness. 
332 pp. Cloth, $1.25. 

The quaintness of the characters described will be sure to make the story very pop- 
ular. — Book Nezvs, Philadelphia. 

A book of much interest and novelty. — The Book Buyer, New York. 



K 



A 



B 



IG CYPRESS. By Kirk Munroe. 164 pp. Cloth, 
1. 00. 

If there is a man who understands writing a story for boys better than another, it is 
Kirk Munroe. — Sprittgfield Repjiltlican. 

A capital writer of boys' stories is Mr. Kirk Munroe. — Outlook. 



F 



VREMAN JENNIE. By Amos R. Wells. A Young 
Woman of Business. 268 pp. Cloth, $1.25. 



It is a delightful story. — T!te Advance. Chicago. 

It is full of action. — The Standard, Chicago. 

A story of decided merit. — The £/nvorth Herald, Chicago. 



M 



YSTERIOUS VOYAGE OF THE DAPHNE. 

By Lieut. H. P. Whitmarsh. 305 pp. Cloth, $1.25. 

One of the best collections of short stories for boys and girls that has been pub- 
lished in recent years Such writers as Hezekiah Butterworth, Wm. O. Stoddard, and 
Jane G. Austin have contributed characteristic stories which add greatly to the general 
interest of the book. 



IV. A. Wilde Company .^ Boston and Chicago. 
viii 



SEP 27 



